BY Kyle Marie McMahon
Cognizant Major League Cricket (MLC) opened its 2024 season in Morrisville on July 5. Despite the sweltering heat, the community packed Church Street Park (5800 Cricket Pitch Way) to watch MI New York defeat the Seattle Orcas by six wickets.
This is just the second season for MLC, which has six teams. MI New York won the inaugural title last year, and while the players hope for a repeat, Head Coach Robin Peterson says, “Last year is last year. Yes, it’s nice to come into a tournament as defending champions, but everybody starts on no points again. We’re very cognizant of the fact we’ve got to go and earn it again and play some good cricket if we’re going to be successful in this competition.”
MLC is a Twenty20 league, which is a shortened format of cricket, designed to be played in a few hours rather than five days. If you are new to the sport, the rules may feel intimidating, but upon arrival, the league provides you with a handout to explain the scoring. For those familiar with baseball, it can be helpful to use it as a comparison for understanding the basics.
As in baseball, there is a fielding team and a batting team. Imagine the area from home plate to the pitcher’s mound. In cricket, this is called the pitch. There is still a pitcher (called a bowler) and a catcher (called a wicket-keeper), but instead of bases, cricket has “wickets,” which are three stumps with connecting sticks on top. The remainder of the fielding team is in the circular field that surrounds the pitch. The fielding team’s goal is to dismiss batters (get an out), which can be done by breaking the wickets or fielding the ball.
The batting team’s goal is to protect the wicket and hit the ball for runs. Two batters take the pitch at a time, standing at opposite wickets. Only one batter will hit the ball, but both will run, and each time they cross the pitch to the opposite wicket, a run is scored. As with all sports, there are special rules around batting, fielding and scoring, but you don’t need to know them all to start enjoying the game.
And with continued investment in Church Street Park, you can expect interest in the sport to continue to grow. Harmeet Singh Baddhan, bowler for the Orcas, loves getting to play here. He says, “Every time we come here, it’s such good hospitality. People love cricket out here. It’s a smaller community, but there’s a lot of love for the game.”
It’s been an exciting and tight race this season, which was expanded to 21 matches, up from 15 last season. Washington Freedom is in first place with seven points, but there are still plenty of games to play. You can still catch the last game in North Carolina on July 17 at 3 p.m. before the season wraps in Grand Prairie, Texas. The round-robin playoffs will start July 24, with the championship game commencing on July 28 at Grand Prairie Stadium. Don’t stress if you weren’t able to make it to a game: the Minor League Cricket season, where you can watch our very own Morrisville Raptors play at Church Street Park, will start soon after.
