One such young woman who had interest in cricket was Christina Willes who was the sister of Kent county player John Willes in England. While playing cricket with her brother in their garden, Christina found that her skirt was getting in the way of bowling underarm. Apparently, skirts were pretty large, huge and voluminous those days. Obviously she didn't like the skirt getting in the way of her bowling style. She then tried to bowl overarm (or may be you can say partly round-arm) to her brother John Willes.
John Willes observed her sister's bowling action. He then started learning this style from her. On July 15, 1822 Kent County was playing against MCC in Lord's. John Willes was playing for Kent Country. He bowled the first ball of his over using a round-arm style. The umpire declared it as no-ball because,as I said earlier, anything that is not underarm was illegal those days.
The moment umpire gave a no-ball, John Willes threw the ball down, got on his horse and left the ground. As a protest, he never played a match since then. But what he left behind was an idea for the cricketing world and for the cricket lawmakers to amend the laws and adopt overarm bowling.
Over the years, roundarm and overarm bowling became the only legal ways of bowling. Underarm bowling is now termed as illegal. John Willes and more importantly his sister Christina Willes remained the unsung heroes.
What woman created centuries ago, (gentle)men embraces it till date. Isn't this a shower-thought?
Now for something more interesting: Want to learn What happens when you hit longest six at World's Highest Cricket Ground ?
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