The Impact Of Morphological Traits On Cricket Batsmen's Batting Performance: A Comprehensive Review

Abstract

Background: Batting performance in cricket is traditionally assessed by the batting average and strike rate of a batsman. The advent of T-20 cricket matches has placed significant emphasis on a batsman's strike rate, prompting coaches and team management to seek ways to increase it. Elevating the strike rate necessitates a batsman's ability to execute powerful boundary shots, enabling them to score maximum runs within a minimum number of balls faced. Thus, this study was designed to investigate the influence of body size on the batting performance of cricket batsmen.

Methods: The literature for this study was sourced from cricket coaching manuals, cricket literature, cricket batting videos, biographies of cricket batsmen, and research articles. Academic documents were identified and selected from databases such as Google Scholar, Research Gate, EBSCO, and ProQuest, covering the period from 1990 to 2019.

Results: The comprehensive literature review suggests that a batsman's stature, longer legs, extended arms, and lean body mass have a positive impact on their ability to execute powerful cricket shots. Additionally, having well-developed muscle strength contributes to increasing the initial velocity of a bat swing, allowing for successful and powerful shots in cricket.

Conclusions: While the height and limb length of batsmen are associated with improved batting performance, specific training can further enhance a cricket batsman's ability to execute powerful shots. A recommended avenue for future research is to explore the impact of training on batting performance.