I was reading up about the new Century Cricket project that is being built in Manhattan , New York. Ricky Ponting the ex Australian cricket captain is an investor and ambassador with the project and the entire project sounds magnificent. This actually got me excited because it would get me back training.
The technology that has been developed has made this possible and when comparing what we had growing up the youth of today are extremely fortunate. I would have loved to have had these types of facilities because training under these types of conditions will only improve you as a player taking you to the next level. A couple of years in this facility would take an average player creating and develop new skills that the same player would be unrecogniseable.
We had great facilities when growing up which I would happily say was the best available at that time. Every Friday afternoon a group of us would meet at Newlands cricket ground and train in their facilities. The deal was we would also become net bowlers for the professional plyers if they needed batting practice. Sometimes we would be chased away, but more often than not we were welcome to use the nets.
Back in the 1980's there was a bowling machine called Jugs which I just learned is the manufacturers name and not the machine name. The two round discs used to rotate up to a maximum of 90mph or 144kmh and would propel the ball at the batsmen. The machine could be set to pitch at various distances and the speed could also be adjusted. The was cutting technology back in the day and why I found the Century Cricket technology so interesting.
The latest bowling machine can be loaded up with a bowlers data and the machine will replicate those balls bowled. This is seriously great news for batsmen about to play other teams internationally as they can spend hours practicing facing balls which they will be facing for real when the test match starts. Sure the one variable you cannot predict is the pitch so the bounce will vary and not be 100% the same as the real life match. Still this gives you a head start and takes away any surprises if you have never faced that bowler before.
I do think even today this is something that I would join just for the fun of it as you would be exercising without even calling it exercise as the enjoyment factor being able to do this again is kind of crazy. Spending an hour in the nets facing a bowling machine that offers different balls will have you hopping around and will keep your hand eye coordination back to where it once was in the past.
Gym memberships are fine for people that never played sports as I found if you are actively playing sport outside going to the gym is not important mainly as you do not need it. I have never been a gym bunny as being fit and having strength from every day skills doing things naturally is much more fun. We used to carry logs and bricks in rucksacks to build up strength doing squats replicating gym work whilst carrying these types of items. There is something I would call gym fitness and sporting fitness and the sporting fitness/match fitness is on a totally different level to being gym fit which you cannot compare.
The Manhattan is the first one of it's kind as they believe cricket in the US could grow considerably. I wish they had one of these down the road and this will not be cheap and would expect this to cost more than a gym membership.
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