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MIT Cricket Club: On Fire on Astroturf

Aug 26, 2009
Nancy DuVergne Smith
slice.mit.edu
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Cricket is roaring back at MIT. The MIT Cricket Club was founded in 1996 by enthusiastic students who brought the love of the game from their homelands, primarily India and Pakistan. After a few years, this group graduated and the club slumbered. But last year a new generation of cricket-crazed students hosted the first ever cricket tournament at MIT last summer. And they have stayed hot.

Grad students Srinivasan Jagannathan, left, and Ankur Sinha check the taped tennis balls in preparation for a cricket match at MIT. Tech Photo: Noah Spies.

This summer, ten teams participated in the MIT Cricket Club’s summer tournament, including the MIT Electrons and the MIT Protons; university teams from BU, UMass, Yale, and elsewhere; and community teams such as the Cambridge Cricket Club.

Of course, there has to be an MIT twist. These games were dubbed “MIT tennis ball cricket” because they were played with taped tennis balls. Using taped tennis balls on an Astroturf surface “added to the novelty,” according to a Tech article, which reported the “tense and riveting encounters punctuated by awe-inspiring sixes, intimidating yorkers and bouncers, and match-turning catches.”

Taped tennis balls, adopted in 2008 after thorough investigation, also have a safety feature. Graduate student Ankur Sinha told The Tech that the standard cricket ball, made of leather, could not be used on Astroturf “because it bounced too high and could injure players. The organizers experimented with many different kinds of balls and finally settled on hard tennis balls with tape. This type of ball bounces less than the hard leather ball, but more than a softer tennis ball. The tape reduces friction and makes the ball slide over the surface so that it comes onto the bat well. As with everything else, MIT students brought innovation into cricket as well.”

Check the MIT Cricket Club for stats from past matches plus the details on the upcoming fall MIT Cricket Weekend Series.

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Comments

Cric High

Sat, 04/02/2011 6:29am

Well not sure about "Pakistan" inventing it.. but it definitely is an old innovation played worldwide.

Great to see MIT students getting on with this game!

Ahmed Shakhir

Sat, 06/20/2015 1:07pm

Look Adnan Pakistan is the biggest cricketing country after India and you can't say that Pak kids are poor. If those were poor, the world could have missed to watch Akram, Imran, Miyandad, Inzamam and more big guns of cricket.

And yeah kids here in Asia are used to play cricket from their childhood just like other countries' kids are addicted for football.

Jenny Adward

Thu, 06/18/2015 6:31am

In India and Pakistan, Cricket is the game which small kids are used to play from the moment they born. As they start to play cricket, they are introduced with plastic balls, rubber balls, tennis balls, at times hockey balls and then they play with cricket ball i.e. leather ball.

So it is fine to start with small things and the move on to big ones. Good think by MIT.. :-)

Ankur Sinha

Thu, 01/06/2011 5:37am

Adnan,
I have not seen heavy tennis ball taped cricket being played in any part of United States or South Asia. We toyed with many balls, and finally settled for this combination. This has worked very well on astroturf. Innovation can happen at many places, I never claimed it was an invention. And neither am I accrediting the club, someone on earth may have done it before. Innovation lies in utilizing the circumstances, tools, techniques to create something new, and I can safely state that I have not seen such cricketing conditions anywhere in New England, if at all I may be mistaken for the entire US.

Cheers for cricket!
Ankur

Adnan Baig

Wed, 03/17/2010 1:40am

As with everything else, MIT students brought innovation into cricket as well.”

That's no innovation by MIT. Credit goes to the poor kids of Pakistan, who introduced taped ball cricket back in early 80s.