Superstitions In Cricket: Cricket is a game of emotions, where players are intensely attached to the results, and often they have some superstitions that they follow to perform well in their department. This has been evident in the athletes around the globe, where they use some of their tricks to get a breakthrough for the team in the game when it’s needed the most.
Bizarre Superstitions in cricket
Bails Change: The fielding team changes the bails from the batting end to take a wicket when they need it the most. It was seen in an Ashes clash of ENG vs AUS in England, where Stuart Broad changed the sequence of bails while Usman Khawaja was batting, and fortunately got a wicket on the next ball.
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I guess swopping the bails trick works #ENGvsAUS #Ashes #Broad #Cricket pic.twitter.com/s2HC6nxZAB
— Paul Adams (@PaulAdams39) July 31, 2023
Kisses The Ball: Lasith Malinga is one of cricket’s true superstars because of his unusual bowling style, and additionally, he has an unusual habit – he kisses the ball before he bowls every delivery. His kisses are infused with a sense of direction of luck.
After debuting in 2004 with a goofy curly hairstyle, a quick run-up, and a slinging legside action. Batsmen began to fear him when he had a phenomenal achievement in the 2007 World Cup – four wickets, in four balls.
Even after many injuries, Malinga’s legacy is cemented. He retired in 2010 from Test cricket, leaving with 101 wickets. He has 338 ODI wickets, 97 T20 international wickets, and 170 wickets in the IPL.
In his last ODI against Bangladesh, he had taken 3/38. As with the T20 format, he has retired from ODIs but is still available for T20s. Malinga embodies one of the true superstars in the game.
Red Handkerchief: Steve Waugh used to carry a red handkerchief in his pocket. He is the second most successful captain of Australia with a World Cup trophy in his cabinet.
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Waugh carried this handkerchief in the match because his grandmother gave him this and he believed that it brought him luck. In a career stretching for 19 years, Waugh made 10927 test runs at an astonishing average of 50. Waugh was a right-handed batsman who retired in 2004 against India.
He played a match-saving knock of 80 to deny India a victory in the Sydney test. Nicknamed ‘Tugga’, Waugh will be remembered for his marvellous performance in the 1999 World Cup. He scored 398 runs at an average of 80 to guide Australia to their second World title.
No Jersey no: The most fearless and destructive batsman of India who used to smash a boundary on the first ball of the innings and gather a lot of runs against spinners. Virendra Sehwag, aka Nawab of Najafgarh, is the only Indian to score two triple centuries in Test cricket, that too he completed in Pakistan with a six in the nervous 290s.
Sehwag wore a jersey no. of 44, but due to a pattern visible in his scores, he removed the number from the jersey and played some great historic knocks for the Indian team.
Sehwag scored over 8000 runs in ODIs and tests with an attacking strike rate. In 2011, Sehwag broke Tendulkar’s record of the highest score in ODIs by smashing the West Indies bowlers all around the ground at Indore.
Nelson Bad Luck: Umpires stood on 1 leg when a team or player scored 111 runs or a multiple of it (222, 333, 444). It was believed that the figure 111 looks like stumps without a bail, which means a wicket is near and a player can lose his/her wicket around this figure.
The late, great umpire David Shepherd brought the superstition to prominence as he used to always stand on one leg when the score reached 111.
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