Overarm bowling - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Cricket

Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...

, overarm bowling refers to a delivery in which the bowler's hand is above shoulder height. This is in contrast to a roundarm

Roundarm bowling

In cricket, roundarm bowling is a style that was introduced in the first quarter of the 19th century and had largely superseded underarm bowling by the 1830s. Using a roundarm action, the bowler has his arm extended at about 90 degrees from his body at the point where he releases the ball...

delivery, where the hand is between shoulder height and waist height; and an underarm

Underarm bowling

In cricket, underarm bowling is as old as the sport itself. Until the introduction of the roundarm style in the first half of the 19th century, bowling was performed in the same way as in bowls, the ball being delivered with the hand below the waist...

delivery where the bowler's hand is below waist height.

After roundarm was legalised in 1835 with the bowler allowed to deliver the ball at shoulder height, it was not long before some bowlers began to raise the hand above the shoulder. The Laws of Cricket

Laws of cricket

The laws of cricket are a set of rules established by the Marylebone Cricket Club which describe the laws of cricket worldwide, to ensure uniformity and fairness. There are currently 42 laws, which outline all aspects of how the game is played from how a team wins a game, how a batsman is...

at that time directed that such a delivery be called a no ball

No ball

In the sport of cricket a no ball is a penalty against the fielding team, usually as a result of an illegal delivery by the bowler. The delivery of a no ball results in one run to be added to the batting team's score, and an additional ball must be bowled...

. In 1845, the law was strengthened by removing the benefit of doubt from the bowler in height of hand questions, the umpire's view of the incident being final.

Even so, it was only a matter of time before confrontation occurred. The problem was that many umpires were themselves bowlers and believed that the bowler should be allowed to bowl with a fully raised hand. The watershed was reached on 26 August 1862 at The Oval

The Oval

The Kia Oval, still commonly referred to by its original name of The Oval, is an international cricket ground in Kennington, in the London Borough of Lambeth. In the past it was also sometimes called the Kennington Oval...

when Surrey hosted All-England. The England bowler Edgar Willsher

Edgar Willsher

Edgar "Ned" Willsher was an English cricketer who is famous for being the catalyst in the shift from roundarm to overarm bowling....

deliberately bowled overarm and was no-balled six times in succession by umpire John Lillywhite

John Lillywhite

John Lillywhite was an English cricketer during the game's roundarm era....

, ironically the son of William Lillywhite

William Lillywhite

Frederick William Lillywhite was a famous English cricketer during the game's roundarm era...

, the famous bowler who had done so much to have roundarm legalised in 1835.

In what was surely a pre-rehearsed demonstration, Willsher and the other eight professionals in the England team staged a walkoff, leaving their two amateur colleagues looking non-plussed in the middle. Play continued next day, but Lillywhite diplomatically withdrew and was replaced by another umpire.

MCC

Marylebone Cricket Club

Marylebone Cricket Club is a cricket club in London founded in 1787. Its influence and longevity now witness it as a private members' club dedicated to the development of cricket. It owns, and is based at, Lord's Cricket Ground in St John's Wood, London NW8. MCC was formerly the governing body of...

responded to this "crisis" with rather more haste than they had to roundarm and changed the Laws of Cricket in time for the 1864 season. Law 10 was rewritten to allow the bowler to bring his arm through at any height providing he kept it straight and did not throw the ball. This completed the evolution of bowling and the overarm style has remained predominant ever since, though some conservatives (including W G Grace, no less) did continue to bowl roundarm till the end of their careers; and even underarm itself was still seen occasionally.

An interesting historical development of the legalisation of overarm was that for many years, 1864 was deemed to mark the start of "first-class cricket" which suggested that earlier cricket was "second-class". The 1864 origin has been strongly challenged: see also First-class cricket

First-class cricket

First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...

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