For audacity and defiance look to the hook shot.

For audacity and defiance look to the hook shot.

Over the 100 or so years since the game of cricket, there have been various cricket shots which have been employed by batsmen to score runs off the fast bowlers.  Even new innovative shots like the upper cut, switch hit and the scoop  shots have been employed by the batsmen particularly in T-20 cricket.  Every different shot displays something unique when played perfectly.   For sheer elegance , we look towards a cover drive. A well executed cover drive is the symbol of  perfect timing and elegance.  Similarly   a perfectly executed straight drive defines balance and symmetry in motion, an on drive played against spin defines  the class and mastery of a batsman over the turning ball. Having said all this, for sheer audacity, bravery and ultimate defiance there is no better shot than a perfectly executed hook shot off a genuine quick bowler.

 A hook shot is perhaps the only shot which can really demoralize   and deflate the fast bowler. It is a perfect marriage of the ultimate contest in cricket – that of a fast bowler  steaming in and hurling hand grenades at the opposition batsman and the batsman not just putting bat to ball but playing a hook shot and sending the ball rocketing to the boundary.  For sheer audacity there is no comparison with the hook shot.  It has to be remembered it is also the only shot which guarantees action on a field whether it is played well or it is mistimed .  if it is played perfectly the ball more or less rockets to the boundary, on the other hand when the batsman fails to judge the speed of the ball it might hit the batsman and even if it is an ugly sight seeing a batsman hit by the hard cricket ball, we must remember that such incidents also   separates the men from the boys and in that sense action to a spectator watching in the drawing room at home or the one witnessing it live in the ground is guaranteed. Subsequently if the batsman slightly mistimes the hook shot, he might get caught  in the deep or the ball might fall tantalizingly in no man’s land. So in any which action is very much on the cards when a batsman attempts a hook shot.

 For me if a batsman has to consider himself to be a great player of fast bowling, then he must be able to take on the quickies and he cannot do that unless he plays the hook shot very well. There have been several players who have played the hook shot , some out of sheer bravado, some out of the fear of being hit and some to prove a point to the bowlers by taking the attack up to him.  There is nothing more emphatic a statement when a batsman pulls of a great hook shot . there have been players who have scored plenty of runs off the hook shot and at the same time the same shot has brought about their downfall.  Through the 70’s and 80’s which is considered the era where great fast bowlers  ruled the roost in test cricket, there have been several fine batsmen , the likes of Viv Richards, Roy Fredricks, Gordon Grenidge Ian Chappell, Ian Bothom  and Mohinder Amaranth to name a few who made effective use of the hook shot.

Each batsman had a unique style of playing the hook shot.  For batsmen like Viv Richards, who had a swagger and an aura about him when he came to the batting crease, his demeanour was such that the hook shot was an extension of his  aggressive intent and his way of telling the bowlers that he was coming to get them and they better be ready. Viv Richards played fearless cricket and the hook shot served him quite well when he took on fast men like Imran Khan, Lillee and Thomson. One of the most important aspects about batsmen who played the hook shot in the 70’s and 80’s was that without helmet they ran the risk of wearing the hard leather ball if they failed to judge the speed and the line of the bouncer, which makes the shot makers all the more remarkable. Before the helmet era.

Ian Chappell loved the cross batted shots and growing in Australia the horizontal hook and the cut shots came very naturally to him and just when everybody lauded his younger brother Greg about his playing in the V, Ian would be quick to retort that  even he  played in the V but the difference being in square  direction of the  arena. Being Aussie skipper when Ian Chappell was going through a lean trot  and was repeatedly getting dismissed  playing the hook shot, he received a huge collection of letters from fans  stacked up together requesting him to relinquish the hook shot which was bringing about his downfall, typically in Ian chappell’s style he did not bother and scored 56 runs in the next innings with a staggering 40runs off the hook shot.

Roy Fredricks and Gordon Grenidge were great hookers  ( pun unintended ) of a cricket ball and  the image of  Roy Fredricks playing the hook shot against one D K Lillee  in the 1975 world cup final at lords is fresh among the people who saw it, the only problem being he trod back on the stumps and was dismissed hit wicket.  One can never forget the innings which Gordon Grenidge played against England chasing 342 at lords , Grenidge scored 214 not out where he made liberal use of the hook shot.

 Mohinder Amaranth  was one helluva player when it came to  playing against the genuine quick bowlers of his era. He  was possibly one of the rare sub continental batsmen who played the hook shot successfully and he was known for his tenacity in  standing up to the quicks, be it in Antigua when in the first innings, he scored 91 gallant runs  hitting 3 hook shots for sixes against the likes of Roberts and holding. During the second innings, he was hit by a ball in  his  mouth off Marshall but typical of the man he scored 80 runs in the innings. He scored more than 1000 runs on the 2 tours of West Indies and Pakistan which were 2 of the best fast bowling attacks going around and hooked the fastest men all round the park.

 Of the modern era a certain R T Ponting  was one of the top batsmen who successfully played the hook shot and with much elan. Ponting  who had a natural forward lunge against fast bowlers would not mind pulling and hooking even of the front foot. He used to swivel  beautifully and rarely had a problem scoring off the hook shot.