Types of shots in cricket: every batting shot, named and explained

How cricket shots are classified

There is no official list of cricket shots. Britannica names five chief strokes — the forward stroke, the back stroke, the leg glance, the cut and the pull or hook — and notes that a forward stroke played with aggressive intent becomes a drive. Coaches then split each family by direction and add the sweeps and modern shots, which is why most lists run past 20 names. This guide covers 21.

Two choices define every shot. The first is the foot: a front-foot shot moves the front leg towards where the ball pitches, while a back-foot shot moves the back leg back before the ball is played. The second is the bat. Britannica says good batting is based on a straight, vertical bat presenting its full face to the ball, although a cross, horizontal bat can deal effectively with short bowling. Drives, defences and glances are straight-bat shots; cuts, pulls, hooks and sweeps are cross-bat shots.

Length decides the foot. A good-length ball leaves the batter unsure whether to go forward or back; a half volley is pitched up far enough to drive just after it bounces; a long hop is short of a good length; and a yorker lands on or inside the popping crease. Line then decides the direction.

Nobody learns all 21 at once. New Zealand Cricket’s curriculum for 11- to 13-year-olds covers six shots — the front-foot drive and defence, the back-foot drive and defence, the pull and the cut — and adds the sweep from 14.

Front-foot shots: the forward defence and the drives

The forward defence is played to a good-length ball: not full enough to drive, not short enough to go back. ESPNcricinfo’s coaching guide puts the front foot as close as possible to the pitch of the ball, the head over the bat and the bat angled close to the front pad so the ball cannot pass between bat and pad. New Zealand Cricket adds a rule worth keeping: only defend deliveries that threaten the stumps or the batter.

The drives build on the same movement. The off drive is played to an over-pitched ball in line with off stump or just outside it: for a right-hander the left shoulder and elbow lead, the bat strikes the ball just in front of the front foot and finishes over the left shoulder, with the head over the ball at impact. If the ball is slightly wider, the front foot steps in the direction you want to hit it and the shot becomes the cover drive, explained step by step in how to play the cover drive.

The straight drive is the same stroke with the front foot pointing down the pitch and the shoulders opened slightly, so the full face of the bat travels down the line of the ball and back past the bowler. The on drive is played to an over-pitched ball on leg stump: the front foot goes outside the line of the ball, the swing runs from the slips towards mid-on, and the guide calls it a difficult shot.

The lofted drive uses the same footwork to go over the infield. Contact is further from the front toe and the follow-through is full; the guide warns against lifting the head early or letting the weight fall onto the back foot.

Back-foot shots: defence, punch, cut, pull, hook and glance

The back-foot defence is for a short ball in line with the stumps that is not short enough to attack. The back foot moves back and across, stays parallel to the crease, and the front elbow is held high to keep the bat straight. The back-foot drive, often called the punch, is its attacking cousin: New Zealand Cricket coaches it with the back foot across to off stump and the toes facing point, hands high to get above the ball, a high front elbow and a still head.

The square cut is played to a ball short and wide outside off stump. The back foot moves back and across, the bat comes down from the top of the backlift and meets the ball at arm’s length in front of the body, and the wrists roll to keep it on the ground. New Zealand Cricket stresses that consistent bounce is crucial. Graham Thorpe has observed that players often back-foot drive short, wide balls instead of cutting them; his drill, described in Wisden, feeds those balls while the batter keeps the top hand off the bat.

Britannica describes the cut as going square or behind the wicket. Hit later and finer, it becomes the late cut, which the Cambridge Dictionary defines as an attacking shot hit lightly through the area behind the batter on the off side.

The pull is played to a short ball arriving between knee and stomach height, on any line from off stump to outside leg. The batter moves back inside the line, opens the body to face the bowler and swings across the line with the arms extended. The line sets the direction: towards mid-on for a ball on off stump, through midwicket for middle, and square leg or long leg for leg stump and outside. The hook is the same idea against a bouncer at chest height or above, sent between square leg and fine leg.

The leg glance deflects the ball behind the wicket on the leg side. Writing for ESPNcricinfo, Jon Hotten notes that Ranjitsinhji is credited with creating it, and that it was the first shot to use the bowler’s pace deliberately to send the ball behind the wicket. It can be played off either foot, and New Zealand Cricket lists both versions among the scoring shots to use early in an innings against spin turning into the batter.

The sweep family: sweep, paddle, reverse sweep and slog sweep

The sweep is a cross-bat, front-foot shot played mostly against spin. New Zealand Cricket’s coaching points are a positive step towards the ball with the head over the front knee at impact, the front leg acting as a second line of defence, the arms at full extension and a stable base. Judging length is crucial, and the manual calls the sweep a risky shot when the ball is turning or bouncing a lot.

Cricket Australia’s trick-shot playbook describes the paddle as a sweep without the power, using the bowler’s pace to guide the ball fine on the leg side when fine leg is inside the circle; its risk is an exposed front pad. The reverse sweep keeps an orthodox grip and stance but swings around the front shoulder from leg to off, finding the boundary anywhere from cover to third man when the leg side is protected. It is hard to control and often goes in the air.

The slog sweep goes up and over. Moeen Ali’s advice, in Wisden, is to keep the front foot inside the line of the ball and pointing down the pitch, which frees the hands, then swing cleanly with the wrists and hand speed rather than force. Aim fairly straight, mostly towards cow corner: against off-spin, the main danger is trying to hit too square.

Modern and improvised shots

The switch hit changes grip and stance completely as the bowler comes in, so a right-hander becomes a left-hander and can reach a side the field has left open. Cricket Australia rates it 8 out of 10 for difficulty. When Kevin Pietersen played it against New Zealand in 2008, MCC ruled that it conformed to the Laws and would not be legislated against, while noting that it carries a great deal of risk for the batter. Under the current Laws, the off side for LBW is set by the batter’s position when the ball comes into play, and a wide is judged against where the batter is standing or has stood since then.

The ramp, or scoop, uses the bowler’s pace to guide the ball behind the wicket with a horizontal bat pointed down the pitch, usually against fast bowling when the fielders behind square are up. Hotten traces it to Zimbabwe’s Dougie Marillier flicking Glenn McGrath over his shoulder to the fine-leg boundary and to Tillakaratne Dilshan’s “Dilscoop” by 2009. If it goes wrong, Cricket Australia notes, the batter is defenceless.

The upper cut lifts a short ball over the wicketkeeper or slips with a horizontal bat; Hotten credits Sachin Tendulkar with turning it into a genuine scoring shot against very quick bowling. Mistimed, it is caught behind. The helicopter, associated with MS Dhoni, is played off the back foot to a full-length ball: the bottom hand whips through and the bat finishes in a lasso-arc above the head. Cricket Australia’s playbook notes that it exposes the stumps and suits small grounds.

Which shot for which ball, and where it goes

Read the table by length first, then line. Directions are for a right-handed batter; mirror them for a left-hander. The risk column summarises what the coaching sources say about each shot rather than a measured dismissal rate.

What bowlers offer decides where the runs come from. In 503 sixes hit in men’s international one-day and T20 cricket, half volleys and balls outside off stump produced more sixes on the off side than expected, while short-pitched and fast bowling produced more behind square (Jamil and colleagues, 2022).

Learning the shots, and checking them on video

There is no single correct way to play any of these shots. New Zealand Cricket’s manual says plainly that there is no one way to bat, and encourages coaches to let players solve problems rather than prescribe every movement. A sensible order follows its curriculum: defences and drives first, then the cut and pull, then the sweeps, with improvised shots once the base is reliable.

Practise against real bowling where you can. Young batters facing a bowling machine started their backswing and front-foot movement later, lifted the bat less high and took a shorter step than against a bowler delivering at the same speed, about 101 km/h (Pinder, Renshaw and Davids, 2009). A machine is useful for repetition; it should not be the only thing a batter faces.

Video shows what feel hides. Filmed side-on and from in front, a set of shots shows whether the head stays still, where the front foot lands and whether the base holds as the shot changes; batting technique analysis explains how to read those measurements, and Stance measures base, trunk rotation, head stability and sequencing from phone footage, shot by shot. What one camera can and cannot see is covered in cricket biomechanics from video.