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Slips and slides and the game of cricket
Slips and slides, as we know them, are mainly associated with games that children play mostly at parks. Interestingly, slip and slide, more appropriately slider, are also associated with the game of cricket. Almost everyone who has a little bit of knowledge about cricket knows what the term slip means in reference to the game. After all, slips are the various positions beside the wicketkeeper to his/her offside to take a catch as soon as it gets deflected from the bat. The fielders who stand in these positions are called slip fielders and there could be a first slip, second slip and so on till the fifth slip. A slight mistake on the part of the batsman and he or she will be back in the pavilion thanks to the slip position.However, not many are aware of the term slider, a kind of delivery bowled by a spin bowler. The slider has come from the sliding or skidding action of the ball when delivered by a spin bowler. The bowling action looks like a leg break and the batsman, expecting a leg spin, gets deceived when the ball instead of spinning, skids or slides straight into him. Shane Warne, one of the finest spin bowlers that the game of cricket has ever produced, is popularly associated with this delivery. He mastered the delivery and used it to great effect. His dismissal of Ian Bell with the slider in the 2005 Ashes trophy was the talking point then. The delivery's origin is, however, credited to Douglas Thomas Ring, an Australian cricketer who made his international debut in the late 1940s.
Entry for Word pair forum challenge