▷▷▷How to Oil and Season Your Cricket Bat?
Have you bought your cricket bat and cannot wait to use it? It is advisable that you curb your temptation to take it out and have a crack without first seasoning it. Seasoning a bat is very important and essential if you want it to last. A bat is made out of pressed willow after compressing a very large piece of wood into a compact blade. Using it without preparation can cause the compressed wood to splinter and crack easily.
There are just a few things you will need to prepare your bat or the blade as it is commonly referred to. A little bottle of good quality linseed oil, a fiber plaster tape to protect your playing surface, a ball hammer or a bat mallet.
You must first oil the bat. This is to be done once a year and maybe twice a year in hot and humid countries. The purpose of oiling the blade is to keep the bat from drying and thus eventually cracking. While it is important to oil, it is also very important that you do not apply too much oil to a blade. Use your bare finger and dip it in linseed oil. Now finely coat the entire surface of the bat leaving out the just the areas covered by the stickers. Do not worry too much about getting a little oil on the stickers, it will not have any detrimental effect on the blade.
Once you have coated the blade with linseed oil, allow it to rest horizontally for 24 hours. It is very important that you do not rest it standing up as this will cause all the oil to seep downwards and ruin the bat.
Once you have oiled the blade, apply the fiber plaster tape on the playing surface to lock in the moisture. The fiber plaster will also protect the blade from deep seam marks. The next step is to season it. Bat manufacturers will usually give you guidelines on how to knock in a bat. In the absence of that, use a wooden mallet and slowly start to knock in the playing surface of the bat. It is best if you go as high up as the splice of the bat as there will be some contact there as well.
It is also important to season the edges. This is the most vulnerable part of the bat as a leading edge or outside edge at 80 miles per hour can easily crack it. To season the edges, strike the edges gently at a 45 degree handle. It is all right if you start to see the wood smudging a little bit. It is better that you do this rather than allow the ball to do it in a match for you.
You will know that you have knocked in your bat well when you hold up the bat at eye level and notice plenty of dents and an uneven surface of the blade. The next step is to have a few net sessions with an old ball before taking it out for a match.
If you really want to use a bat straight from the store, you should at least avoid the new ball as there is a 50% chance that you will break your brand new bat when facing a new ball.
Ball Hammer
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