Most of the time, when someone mentions the sport of cricket in America, that’s exactly what they get. Crickets. But maybe you heard about Team USA’s shocking upset over Pakistan in the Twenty20 Cricket World Cup last Thursday. If the sentence “Nitish Kumar hit a match-saving boundary to force the Super Over” has your head spinning, here’s a quick beginner’s guide to the game of cricket, including everything you need to know to follow Team USA as it continues its run at the T20 Cricket World Cup.
Cricket is the world’s second-most popular sport after soccer, attracting a global audience of more than 2.5 billion across 180 countries. The International Cricket Council (ICC) estimates that the U.S. is home to 30 million cricket fans. A drop in the bucket compared to major sports in America? Yes. But, according to USA Cricket, there are now more than 400 cricket leagues in the U.S., featuring more than 200,000 players. The sport will be featured at the Olympics in Los Angeles in 2028; and just last year, Major League Cricket debuted in the U.S., backed by $120 million from a group of investors that included Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Texas businessman Ross Perot Jr.
Cricket is sort of like baseball, but not really
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams featuring 11 players each. One team bats, attempting to score as many runs as possible, while the other team takes the field and tries to get the batters out. The goal is to score more runs than your opponent.
That’s where the similarities with baseball end.
The fielding team puts all 11 players on the field—nine fielders, one bowler (pitcher), and one wicket-keeper (catcher). Unlike baseball, which is played on a diamond, cricket is a 360-degree game played on an oval-shaped field. Just like the batters in baseball are confined to the infield, cricket batters (batsmen) are confined to the “pitch,” a central rectangular strip of short grass, 66 feet long and 10 feet wide, with “wickets” at each end.
The game centers around the wickets, which consist of three wooden stakes (stumps) with two wooden crosspieces (bails) resting horizontally across the top. The bowler’s goal is to bowl the ball past the batsman and break the wicket, while the batsman’s job is to protect the wicket and put the ball in play.
No balls, no strikes . . . and what’s an “over”?
A play begins when the bowler—with a running start—bowls the ball toward the batsman, most often bouncing it. If the ball does not bounce, it’s called a “full toss,” which is rare, mostly because it’s much easier to hit.
There are no strikes, and there is no strike zone. The batsman can choose not to swing, or swing and miss, and will not get out as long as the wicket is safe. The bowler, however, can only bowl six deliveries at a time. This is called an “over.” After a bowler completes six legal deliveries, a teammate takes their place.
An illegal delivery from a bowler is called a “no-ball.” A no-ball doesn’t count toward a bowler’s six legal balls in an over, but the fielding team is penalized a run, which is added to the batting team’s score. Another form of illegal delivery is a “wide,” which is a ball the umpire deems to be too wide or high to be hit by the batter. A wide also merits a one-run penalty—but unlike a no-ball, it counts toward a bowler’s over.
How do teams score?
The batting team has two players at bat at any given time on opposite ends of the pitch.
Yes, two batters.
There are no bases. When a batsman puts the ball in play, the batters switch places, running to the opposite ends of the pitch as they would be running to a base in baseball. The fielding team’s job is to retrieve the ball and knock one of the bails off the wicket before a player reaches that side of the pitch. If both players reach the other side safely, they have scored a run. They can keep switching sides as many times as they can before either gets out or before the fielding team gets the ball back into the pitch safely, recording one run each time both players complete the switch.
There are home runs, too
Around the perimeter of the oval-shaped field is the “boundary.” Think of it like the outfield fence in baseball, only it’s marked by either a line, rope, or a much-shorter barrier.
If a player hits the ball and it rolls to the boundary or bounces before going over it, the batsman is awarded four runs. If the ball clears the boundary in the air, it’s worth six runs.
How do you get players out?
There are 10 ways to get out in cricket, but the most common are getting bowled, caught out, or run out.
Getting bowled is when the bowler either hits the wicket or the batsman deflects the ball into the wicket. If at least one of the bails is knocked off, the batsman is out. A batsman can also be called out on an LBW (leg-before-wicket), which is when the batsman swings and misses and the ball hits his leg before it reaches the wicket.
A batsman is “caught out” when the ball is hit and the fielder catches it in the air, like a flyout in baseball. If the ball is put in play and the fielding team throws it back in and knocks a bail off the wicket before the runner reaches that side, that player is “run out.”
Team USA at the Twenty20 World Cup
There are a handful of different cricket formats. In test cricket, for instance, a match can last up to five days, with each day scheduled for six hours of play. In the World Cup, they play a Twenty20 format in which each team bats only once for 20 overs. The game usually lasts three to four hours with a scoring average of between 320 and 330 runs between the two teams. A Super Over—which Team USA needed to defeat Pakistan last week—is a tiebreaking method in which both teams play a single additional over of six balls to determine the winner of the match.
The U.S. came into the T20 World Cup ranked 18th globally in the ICC Men’s T20I rankings. With wins over then-sixth-ranked Pakistan and Canada in their first two matches, Team USA has risen one spot to No. 17. They face top-ranked India on Wednesday, followed by 11th-ranked Ireland on Friday.
And now, if Team USA captain Monank Patel hits a boundary to end the over and force a Super Over in the T20 World Cup, you’ll know exactly how to react.