Mobile Computing with a Smart Cricket Ball: Discovery of Novel Performance Parameters and Their Practical Application to Performance Analysis, Advanced Profiling, Talent Identification and Training Interventions of Spin Bowlers

Abstract

Introduction: Profiling of cricket bowlers is performed with motion analyses systems that require the placement of markers on the bowler’s body and on the ball. Conventional smart balls such as cricket and baseballs provide only one speed and one spin rate datum at the release point, which is insufficient for biomechanical profiling. Method: In this study, we used an advanced smart cricket ball that measures the angular velocity at 815 Hz and calculates four further physical performance parameters (resultant torque, spin torque, power and angular acceleration) and five new skill parameters (precession, normalised precession, precession torque, efficiency and ratio of angular acceleration to spin rate), which we used for profiling and talent identification of spin bowlers. Results: The results showed that the spin rate is a function of physical (torque) and skill proficiency, namely how efficiently the torque is converted to angular velocity rather than being wasted for precession. The kind of delivery also influences the efficiency, as finger-spin deliveries were less efficient than wrist-spin ones by 6.8% on average; and topspin deliveries were generally more efficient than backspin ones by 15% on average. We tested three bowlers in terms of physical and skill performance during a 10-over spell, revealing that some parameters can improve or decline. When profiling a topspinner, we detected from the performance parameters a lower skill performance than expected, because there was an initial arm motion for backspin delivery before releasing the ball with a topspin. After training intervention, the skill parameters improved significantly (the efficiency increased from 39% to 59%). Conclusions: The advanced smart cricket ball is a classic example of mobile computing for sport performance analysis that can conducted indoors as well as outdoors, generating instant data from 10 performance parameters that provide critical feedback to the coach and bowler.

The impact of augmented feedback (and technology) on learning and teaching cricket skill: A systematic review with meta-analysis

“…The literature search resulted in 8,262 records from six databases. The PRISMA flow diagram of search strategy, study selection and exclusion reasoning are presented in Fig 1 . A total of 11 studies were included in qualitative synthesis [42][43][44][45][49][50][51][52][53][54][55]. Two studies incorporated a study design that consisted of multiple experiments [50] or case studies [53].…”

“…The PRISMA flow diagram of search strategy, study selection and exclusion reasoning are presented in Fig 1 . A total of 11 studies were included in qualitative synthesis [42][43][44][45][49][50][51][52][53][54][55]. Two studies incorporated a study design that consisted of multiple experiments [50] or case studies [53]. For these, only the experiment or case study relevant to this systematic review (i.e., featuring augmented feedback) was included and reported on.…”

“…Seven studies were conducted in Australia [42-44, 50-52, 55], with the remaining four from the United Kingdom [45,49,53,54]. Two single-case studies did not include participant information (n = 2) [50,52], with the remaining studies reporting all male participants (n = 168) ranging from the ages of 13 [55] to 36 years [42]. Five studies focused on the cricket skill of batting [42][43][44][45]53], five focused on bowling [49,50,52,54,55] and one on the skill of fielding [51].…”

“…Two single-case studies did not include participant information (n = 2) [50,52], with the remaining studies reporting all male participants (n = 168) ranging from the ages of 13 [55] to 36 years [42]. Five studies focused on the cricket skill of batting [42][43][44][45]53], five focused on bowling [49,50,52,54,55] and one on the skill of fielding [51]. Seven studies involved adults of differing skill levels; four from an elite level (state cricket and above) [43,51,52,54], and three from a sub-elite level (district cricket/semi-professional) [42,44,49].…”

“…All studies involved the provision of augmented feedback within the intervention, with only one study exploring multiple types of augmented feedback [45]. Mechanisms of feedback provided included verbal [44,53], visual [42,43,51,52], or a combination [45,49,50,54,55].…”