It is always challenging bowling abroad - you don't get much spin, bounce. You do get bounce, but you don't get sideways spin. It is always drifting kind of spin you get.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
There's kind of a Zen aspect to bowling. The pins are either staying up or down before you even throw your arm back. It's kind of a mind-set. You want to be in this perfect mind-set before you released the ball.
I do not play golf regularly, but I feel that hitting the moving ball in cricket is tougher than hitting a stationary ball as in golf, which requires more concentration and steady hands.
Unless someone wants to look funny, I'll not recommend anyone to copy my bowling action. But on a serious note, with the confidence that I have got from the amount of runs I have been scoring, when I'm thrown the ball to bowl, I am pretty sure of what I have to do. I may not be the most attractive to watch while bowling, but I can be effective.
I have always hated bowling, and I don't mind admitting it.
Spin is a tricky thing. When you're trying to avoid it - say, on a tee shot, where sidespin puts you in the trees - it's easy to make it happen.
Bowling is all physics and energy distribution. It's F = ma. So it is actually one of the most science-y sports, because it literally is just a ball and a surface and objects to knock down.
Fast bowling is an art, like spin bowling.
I know when I've been playing a lot of golf it takes me a while to get back into cricket again. It's not so much the different shape of the swings, more the fact that you are stationary when you hit a golf ball. In cricket you have to move forward or back, which is an instinctive timing thing.
For me, fielding is everything - it is a passion that comes from within. You can get a bad ball while you bat, and your bowling may not always be up there, but you are completely in control of how well you field.
I grew up playing on unprepared surfaces where your wicket depended on quickly adapting to the bounce. As a kid, I could never differentiate off-spin from leg-spin. All I looked to do was to try to hit the ball before it pitched.