A Call To Modify The Rules For Under 10s

Here on the Queensland Gold Coast junior cricket plays by a modified rule set, as is no-doubt the case in many other places.  As the age group increases the rule modifications diminish such that the under 10s have the most heavily modified set of rules, and the under 17s have very few modifications at all.

In the past several years the modifications for the under 10s has increased and now includes a a definition of a no-ball extends to a ball that does not pitch on the pitch, a free hit forward of the wicket from a cone for a no-ball, runs scored off of a no-ball are the extra and any runs scored from the bat.

The changes also reduce the number of players on a team to eight (some caveats apply) and stipulate field placement for those players.

I am broadly supportive of these rules, and I believe the changes around the no-ball do much to balance play when bowlers are still trying to learn the basics of their art.

However, I do believe that there is justification for a further, simple, tweaking of the rules which is in some ways an extension of the intent of the no-ball rule where the free hit from the cone must be hit forward of the wicket.  That rule is there because there are no fielders behind the wicket except for the wicket keeper, and so any hit behind the wicket is an almost-certain boundary.

The same goes for leg-byes and byes - with the reduced field size most byes and leg-byes will quickly run to the short boundary for four.

If the first few matches of the season are anything to go by, somewhere in the vicinity of a quarter to a third (I am giving benefit of the doubt and estimating on what I feel is the low side) of all runs scored in a game are scored behind the wicket with the vast majority of those from byes resulting from a wayward delivery or a miss from an inexperienced keeper.

To achieve a better balance and a fairer outcome I would like to see the rules about team size and field placement enhanced by a change that limits the number of runs behind the wicket to those run and a boundary from any reason restricted to one run.

You may download a copy of the current rules for junior cricket on the Gold Coast from here.