Bowling Help

[Maccy]

Bought 2015 yesterday on a day off whim and haven't played this since the 2007 version(I think).

Anyway, I started out as Derbyshire and it was going fine for the first couple of county championship matches but now I seem to really struggle with taking wickets. I mean I'm regularly getting hit for 450+ first innings and they're even declaring at 500-600 at times. I figured it might have been because Derby aren't very good so I skipped the game until the end of the season to get a couple of good bowlers in.

So in came Steyn, Stokes(pricey for what he is) and a couple of others but experiment as I might I still keep getting thrashed in the first innings(I'm usually good for 300+ first innings) which either results in me drawing or losing if I have a bad second innings. I can't win any matches at all!

Any advice for things to try in bowling? I don't want to become ridiculously good, I like a challenge but at the moment it feels like I'm missing something important. It's a bit galling when you hit 450 off a great innings only to then get hit for 500+ all the time. The main problem for me seems to be finishing off the tail, the last 4 wickets are usually going for 200 or so.

Apart from that I'm really enjoying the game, although it'd be good if you could work on the leg byes animation so it doesn't look like my wickey has put flippers on instead of gloves.

Thanks in advance

[Alrounder80]

Firstly I suggest you have 4 proper bowlers in your team, meaning they are good enough to be in the side as bowlers alone. Any all-rounders you have in your team are a bonus. I tend to start off with 4 bars of bowling aggression and bowling to the opposite side of the batsmen's strength. So if, for example, a batsman has a strong/slight legside preference, I'll set at four bars and bowl outside off stump. Once batsmen get to 25+ runs, I'll reduce the bar to 3. Once they cross about 60, I'll go down to 2 bars and experiment by going around the wicket and potentially also changing up the length according to what length the batsmen prefers, etc. If you're struggling to get the tail out, use any decent part-timer you have in your team for a few overs. I also recommend having one decent spinner in your side as part of your 4 man bowling attack. If not, potentially an all-rounder who can bowl some spin. They tend to be pretty economical (for me, at least) and can get through lots of overs which allows the fast bowlers to rest. You may also use spinners against batsmen who prefer pace and vice versa.

Now the following is more controversial advice. If the opposition are batting in the 4th innings and the pitch is helpful for bowlers (which it tends to be on days 3 and 4 of a county match, I personally keep the default aggression of 3 bars for bowlers and bowl the default line as well of middle and off. For some reason it works for me and I usually bundle teams out in the 4th innings this way. That's what I did in the 2014 version anyways. If you don't mind losing the odd match by experimenting, you may wish to try this tactic.

Anyways, hope this helped.

[Maccy]

Firstly I suggest you have 4 proper bowlers in your team, meaning they are good enough to be in the side as bowlers alone. Any all-rounders you have in your team are a bonus. I tend to start off with 4 bars of bowling aggression and bowling to the opposite side of the batsmen's strength. So if, for example, a batsman has a strong/slight legside preference, I'll set at four bars and bowl outside off stump. Once batsmen get to 25+ runs, I'll reduce the bar to 3. Once they cross about 60, I'll go down to 2 bars and experiment by going around the wicket and potentially also changing up the length according to what length the batsmen prefers, etc. If you're struggling to get the tail out, use any decent part-timer you have in your team for a few overs. I also recommend having one decent spinner in your side as part of your 4 man bowling attack. If not, potentially an all-rounder who can bowl some spin. They tend to be pretty economical (for me, at least) and can get through lots of overs which allows the fast bowlers to rest. You may also use spinners against batsmen who prefer pace and vice versa.

Now the following is more controversial advice. If the opposition are batting in the 4th innings and the pitch is helpful for bowlers (which it tends to be on days 3 and 4 of a county match, I personally keep the default aggression of 3 bars for bowlers and bowl the default line as well of middle and off. For some reason it works for me and I usually bundle teams out in the 4th innings this way. That's what I did in the 2014 version anyways. If you don't mind losing the odd match by experimenting, you may wish to try this tactic.

Anyways, hope this helped.

Yeah, thanks for your help, mate. About to fire up the game now and give it a go.

[meisme]

How to you skip the season?

[Maccy]

How to you skip the season?

Oh I just meant I skipped each match as they came up so they computer calculated the results.

[Raver]

Hey how do you skip individual matches?

[SomersetCricketer]

Hey how do you skip individual matches?

click the play match, a window will open, click 'skip match', then say yes to the next message

[RVallant]

I personally keep the default aggression of 3 bars for bowlers and bowl the default line as well of middle and off. For some reason it works for me and I usually bundle teams out in the 4th innings this way. That's what I did in the 2014 version anyways. If you don't mind losing the odd match by experimenting, you may wish to try this tactic.

I do 4 aggression but leave it middle and off for both innings, only target weaknesses if they get settled, and very rarely will I ever bowl leg stump as it seems to be a 'hit me now' call for any batsman.

[Bearded]

i tend to go with the defaults of line and length on middle and off then only going wide of off when they're set but i seem to have real trouble getting rid of the tail and always start a season brilliant then struggle to win a game and usually end up 3rd in the second division every season. what am i doing wrong? it can't be all bad as i usually win the first 4/5/6 games then fall away

[Sureshot]

Getting rid of tailenders is one of the problems of the modern era. I've been finding success of late with Pat Cummins (RF), I tend to go full as well. It's crazy though, when you come up against teams that have a #10 who has a first class hundred! Gone are the days of the bunnies.

Is it the bowling in particular you struggle or do you find batsmen go off form too?

[Bearded]

Getting rid of tailenders is one of the problems of the modern era. I've been finding success of late with Pat Cummins (RF), I tend to go full as well. It's crazy though, when you come up against teams that have a #10 who has a first class hundred! Gone are the days of the bunnies.

Is it the bowling in particular you struggle or do you find batsmen go off form too?

just everyone seems to drop off a cliff. probably bowling slightly more and i usually start losing tosses and having to bowl first which means i'm totally hopeless