Cricket is a ball and bat sport, an English cousin of baseball, which combines technical skills, accurate pitching and batting, team spirit and respect on the field (the famous "fair play"). It is said that cricket is a sport with complicated rules... We reassure you right away, the basics of cricket can be learned very quickly!
Like many team sports, cricket is played between 2 teams of 11 players in 2 innings. A match lasts 2.5 hours or longer depending on the format. Before playing, the captains draw lots ("toss"): the one who wins the toss decides whether to bat or bowl first.
In thefirst innings, the batting team brings its first two batsmen onto the field to face the second team consisting of a pitcher, a keeper, and nine chasers.
The pitchers' teammates are called fielders and are spread out over the field to retrieve the ball as quickly as possible and throw it back to the keeper or pitcher.
The captain of the team decides who should throw, thus acting as a coach.
The game begins. The objective of the bowler is to get the 2 pieces balanced on the wicket and thus eliminate the batsman. The batsman has to protect his wicket by beating the ball.
When the ball is hit, the two batsmen take the opportunity to exchange places. Each time they swap places, by means of a run, they score 1 run. If they swap places twice in a row, they score 2 runs, 3 runs, 3 runs etc.
The points are called "runs" because they symbolise the number of runs made. The team that scores the most runs wins the match. Each team plays one after the other.
For the team that bats first, the aim of the game is to score the most runs.
For the team that bats in the second inning, their goal is to score the same number of runs as their opponent +1 run.
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