If it was in July this year it could well have been England - India, I was at the game, it was an awesome day! (England winning helped lol) That was a test match which is a whole different kettle of fish, they can last 5 days!

Yeah basically you’re right about the ways to get out, although there are a few more.

There are three internationally recognised forms of Cricket, but I’ll explain T20 as that is the format for this World Cup and also its the shortest and simplest version.

Put very simply you have two teams, one team will bat - ie - try to score as many runs (points) as they possibly can, whilst the other team bowls (pitches) trying to limit the batters score whilst also trying to get the batters out. Then when their innings is over the other team will come in and try and score at least one more run than them - if they do that, they win, if the don’t then they lose.

The bowling side has 120 balls to bowl at the batters, these balls are divided into “overs” which is 6 balls - that gives you 20 overs (giving the name of the format) two lots of 20 overs or T20)

There are always 2 batters on the pitch at any one time, one stood at either end of the 22 yard playing strip (called a wicket) in the middle of the pitch. So one is facing the bowler and one is stood at the end the bowler runs up from. The batters will try to score as many runs as possible in the 120 balls, they do this by hitting the ball as far as possible then running to the other end of the wicket and swapping places with the other batter. Doing this once counts for 1 run. They can run as many times as they like but if the bowling side get the ball back to either of the three sticks (stumps) that are located either end of the wicket before the batsman makes it back then he’s out.

Other ways to score runs are hitting the ball so that it goes out of the playing area - You get given 4 runs for doing that. Or you can hit the ball so that not only does it go out the playing area, but it doesn’t touch the ground on its way out, that gives you 6 runs. As a batsman you want to score lots of sixes! The other way the batting team scores is through a variety of foul or wide balls, but I won’t bore you with all of that!

So that’s it, the only other complication is that the bowling team can get batters out in a variety of ways, and as a batting team you can only lose 10 of your team to outs (confusingly also called losing a wicket!) once you lose all of your 10 wickets then your innings is over even if you’ve got more or your 120 balls left.

Ways to get out are:

being bowled out - the bowler bowls at you and the ball hits the stumps

Caught - a fielder catches your shot without it hitting the ground first

Run out - what I described above where a fielder hits the stumps with the ball before the batter makes it back safely.

LBW - complicated but basically if the ball is bowled and it hits the batters legs and the umpire thinks that the ball would have gone on to hit the wicket then that is out.

A few others but these are the important ones!

That’s very basically it. Hopefully that helps! No need to explain American football, it’s pretty much rugby league but with fewer downs and more armour lol

What on earth have either Brexit or soccer got to do with this post?

Edit: lol nice ninja edit OP! Still the question remains what has Brexit got to do with this post?

Lol yeah fair point!

That’s a good question. Each format has a pretty good following. Test is considered the purest form of the game by your more traditional cricket fan. It’s very different from the short forms of the game, requiring different tactics and strategies. It’s actually fantastic, but I would probably recommend watching short form 1st to get into it, and you’re right that it’s a struggle to watch all 5 days without missing anything - being fair they don’t always go to the full 5, can be anywhere from three onwards. Normally people will tune in to whatever they can, checking the score for listening on the radio, or having on the tv in the background. (I’m personally looking forward to retiring so I can sit and watch test cricket all day every day lol)

There are a couple of t20 leagues around the world that are exceptionally popular, particularly the IPL in India, which I think apart from the Champions League and maybe the English Premier League is possibly the most watched sports league in the world. These are high stakes, high money leagues that attract the best players around the world to come and play for seasons that last just a few months.

One thing to note is that the players tend to play across all formats and leagues. So for example Ben Stokes, who hit England’s winning runs today in the T20 final, is England’s test cricket captain. And also a significant member of the ODI team. He also plays test cricket, and has played in the IPL and big bash league is it in Australia. This is not uncommon across all top players.

There are three main types of international cricket: Test (5days), ODI (one day) & T20 (3-4 hours). There is a World Cup for all three formats, but as you can imagine test cricket World Cup isn’t this kind of format, and it’s played over a much longer period.

Both the ODI and T20 World Cups are considered proper world cups. This one is T20.

I’m always worried watching England play cricket to be fair! It’s the hope that kills you lol

I’ve been on a flight so just getting the scores through but couldn’t watch the game. Sounds like I missed an absolute classic. Masterclass from Buttler and Hales by the sound of it.

Pakistan - here we come!!