Carpets and corridors: 11 expressions from the cricketing world

The language of any sport is of a piece with its folklore, and helps set it apart from other sports. Cricket is no different in this regard. It has absorbed many expressions which fans and pundits often use to show their proficiency in 'cricket-speak'. Here is a list containing 11 of those expressions:

All along the carpet: When a batsman does not - or cannot - hit the ball in the air and when the ball does not bounce too high after hitting the bat but still goes to the boundary or thereabouts, he is said to have kept the ball 'all along the carpet'. Now, 'carpet' refers to lush green grass, so the term is probably out of place when describing pre-2000 outfields in Asia. Ian Smith, the gritty former New Zealand wicketkeeper and now an ever-excitable commentator, probably renders the term best, while his compatriot Simon Doull also shows a penchant for it.

A ripper: A great catch, ball or stroke, a 'ripper' is anything that gets spectators, whether sitting in the comforts of their homes or watching the action in a stadium, sit up and take notice. Often used in the sentence 'That is a ripper!', 'ripper' may as well be the middle name of Bill Lawry, the commentator and beats his all-embracing 'It's all happening!' for the honour.

Chapati shot: This term has come to us - if memory serves correctly - from the land of the vada pav, and more precisely from the imagination and vocal cords of India's finest opening batsman, Sunil Gavaskar. It refers to a batsman's favourite shot or the one he plays best, and may be most felicitously used while talking about batsmen whose repertoire of strokes is limited in the first place. The British equivalent of the term is the rather bland 'bread-and-butter-shot' - 'that's meat-and-drink for him/her' belongs to the same semantic field - although Nasser Hussain's voice does inject some spice into it.

Corridor of Uncertainty: Neither an actual corridor nor ontologically uncertain, the term refers to a small area outside a batsman's off stump. Purists often encourage top-order batsmen to leave alone balls which are directed there by mean merchants like Glenn McGrath and Curtly Ambrose, especially early in a Test innings. Also known as the channel outside the off stump, which by the way is not a real channel, the term - and it should come as no surprise - has been gifted to the cricketing winds by Geoff Boycott, in whose judgmental Yorkshire accent it is remembered best.

P.S.: When a batsman goes after deliveries in the corridor, conventional wisdom pronounces that he has gone fishing outside the off stump.

Dreaded Finger: This refers to an umpire's right index finger - and in the case of Aleem Dar, Rudi Coertzen and some others, the left - and one which a batsman must dread the most, for it can send him back to the pavilion anytime. The dreaded finger's dreaded finger belongs, of course, to the third umpire, who can overturn on-field decisions by the powers vested in him by the Decision Review System (or, more appropriately, the Dread Redressal System).

Going, going, gone: The voice that gave us 'whaddaplayaa' of Sachin Tendulkar's Desert Storm fame has also given us this simple but sonorous live description of 'a huge six'. Tony Greig, the man to whom that voice belonged may be no more, but some of his memorable phrases continue to survive among fans and commentators alike. In fact, the Australian commentator Dean Jones has made 'going, going, gone' his own over the years.

Overhead conditions: Essentially a reference to cloudy skies, under which the ball starts to do a lot (in entry 9) and the batsman is all at sea. Uniformly relevant in England, New Zealand and South Africa, except perhaps in present-day Cape Town which hasn't seen a cloud in years; relevant for some sessions and in some grounds in Australia; and for some parts of the year in Sri Lanka and the West Indies. Usually not relevant in India.

Show the maker's name: The 'maker' in the expression refers not to God, unless God happens to be the name of a bat maker! The expression is used when a batsman presents a straight bat (to be distinguished from a vertical bat) to the ball and shows, in the process, the manufacturer's label gummed at the top of its face. This writer remembers Sachin Tendulkar's straight drives and Jacques Kallis' forward defensive strokes as the finest tributes ever paid to those who make bats.

The ball doing a lot: When overhead conditions (see entry 7) are favourable, the ball begins to do a lot. Grammatically acceptable variants of the term are used to describe the swinging ball, the seaming ball and, occasionally, even the bouncing ball. The term is rarely used, however, to describe a spinning ball, for which purpose less charitable terms are usually reserved.

Through the gate: A batsman playing an expansive cover drive sometimes leaves a gap between the bat and the front pad - Navjot Singh Sidhu regularly avers that you can drive an automobile through it - which an incoming ball can sneak through on its way to the stumps. The unfortunate batsman is said to be bowled through the gate in such circumstances, although why a gap should be called a gate is beyond the grasp of my limited intelligence.

Shastri-isms: Before he became the India coach, Ravi Shastri was a commentator with a booming voice, whose vocal work sometimes put his strong but quiet deeds on the field in the shade. Unfortunately, however, I am unable to pick just one of Shastri's phrases for inclusion here, because they require an article all to themselves. For now, though, a conclusion to this piece is exactly what the doctor ordered, though it does not come like a tracer bullet.