Box cricket is a unique version of cricket that is played in a small and compact space. It is a great experience for cricket fans who wish to play cricket by taking breaks from their day-to-day life. People planning to play cricket on weekends can go to box cricket and have the experience of playing the game in a small place packed from all four sides.
The concept of Box Cricket has been a common thing in many countries around the world over the years. But in India, it has gained immense popularity in the last few years. Being similar to the game of cricket, Box cricket has different rules from the game played at the professional level. With less space and short boundaries, it becomes more challenging for both batters and bowlers and the rules add extra excitement to the contest
Let’s have a look at the seven famous rules of Box Cricket:
Unique Rules of Box Cricket
- Number of Players: It wouldn’t be an easy task to find all 11 players in a team to play box cricket. Also, there is not enough space for all 11 players to be on the field at the same time. So, the Box cricket is usually played with 6 to 8 players per side. For mixed-gender matches, the number of female players should be the same on both sides.
- Dot-Ball Rule: A match in Box cricket is usually of 5-10 overs per side. So usually there is not much time for the batting team to score runs and the scoreboard has to keep moving. For this, the dot-ball rule can be applied in Box cricket in which the batsman will be declared out if he misses three balls back to back without scoring any run.
- Runs deducted for a wicket: The Box cricket is more a batters-friendly game with shorter boundaries and the bowlers are left with many choices rather than to bowl out the batsman. To counter this, a few runs are deducted for the batting side for the loss of each wicket. Usually, the five runs are deducted for a loss of wicket but it can vary from place to place.
- Jackpot Ball/Over: This rule is basically to encourage the batters to go for rage in the last over. In this rule, the runs scored by the batting team in the last over or the last ball of the innings will be doubled.
- Mode of dismissals: Box cricket brings some interesting mode of dismissals apart from the usual mode. The most common mode of dismissal in box cricket is when the ball directly goes out of the designated box. Apart from this, a batsman can be declared out if the ball is caught by the fielder after rebounding off a net and hasn’t touched the ground.
- Dead ball if the ball hits the roof: In many places in Box cricket, if the batsman hits the ball on the roof, it is considered a dead ball. However, this rule can vary from place to place. Sometimes, if the fielder grabs the ball after it hits the roof, it will be considered a wicket.
- Six is not always highest scoring shot: In Box cricket, six is not alwyas the highest scoring shopt. Sometimes, a batsman can also score 8 to 10 runs on a single without a ball without any wide or no ball.