360º LPT – Text comprehension (unit 4)

You will see a document and three questions. Read the document and answer the questions.

Basics

 

Cricket is a team sport for two eleven-player teams. A formal game of cricket can last anything from an afternoon to several days. Although the game play and rules are very different, the basic concept of cricket is similar to that of baseball. Teams bat in successive innings and attempt to score runs, while the opposing team fields and attempts to bring an end to the batting team’s innings. After each team has batted an equal number of innings (either one or two, depending on conditions chosen before the game), the team with the most runs wins. 

 

( Note: In cricket-talk, the word Innings is used for both the plural and the singular. Inning is a term used only in baseball. )

 

Equipment

 

Cricket Ball:

Hard, cork and string ball, covered with leather. A bit like a baseball (in size and hardness), but the leather covering is thicker and joined in two hemispheres, not in a tennis ball pattern. The seam is thus like an equator, and the stitching is raised slightly. The circumference is between 224 and 229 millimeters (8.81 to 9.00 inches), and the ball weighs between 156 and 163 grams (5.5 to 5.75 ounces). Traditionally the ball is dyed red, with the stitching left white. Nowadays white balls are also used, for visibility in games played at night under artificial lighting.

 

Cricket Bat:

Blade made of willow, flat on one side, humped on the other for strength, attached to a sturdy cane handle. The blade has a maximum width of 108 millimeters (4.25 inches) and the whole bat has a maximum length of 965 millimeters (38 inches).

 

Wickets:

There are two wickets – wooden structures made up of a set of three stumps topped by a pair of bails. Three wooden posts, 25 millimeters (1 inch) in diameter and 813 millimeters (32 inches) high. They have spikes extending from their bottom end and are hammered into the ground in an evenly spaced row, with the outside edges of the outermost stumps 228 millimeters (9 inches) apart. This means they are just close enough together that a cricket ball cannot pass between them.

 

Bails:

Two wooden crosspieces which sit in grooves atop the adjacent pairs of stumps.