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IT鈥橲 BEEN the coach鈥檚 mantra ever since ball games were invented. But 鈥渒eep
your eye on the ball鈥� may not be the best advice for budding sports stars after
all.

Using a miniature camera mounted in cricketer鈥檚 goggles, Michael Land of the
University of Sussex and Peter McLeod of the University of Oxford recorded the
eye movements of three batsmen as they faced fast bowling. In international
cricket, the ball can reach a speed of up to 145 kilometres per hour. The
batsmen ranged from a professional to an 鈥渆nthusiastic but incompetent
补尘补迟别耻谤鈥�.

All three players watched the ball as it started its flight. But then,
instead of tracking it all the way, they shifted their focus towards the spot on
the ground where they expected the ball would land. The best batsman shifted his
focus earlier than the worst. After the ball had bounced, all the players
tracked it again for a short time.

鈥淭he batsmen do not watch the ball continuously,鈥� says Land. And this isn鈥檛
just the case in cricket. Experiments with table-tennis players produced similar
results.

Cricket authorities aren鈥檛 rushing to rewrite the coaching manuals, however.
Keith Tomlins, a coach with the England and Wales Cricket Board, says it鈥檚 well
known that top batsmen use instinct鈥攔ather than sight alone鈥攖o judge
a ball鈥檚 trajectory. 鈥淲hen we video them, we often find that their eyes are
closed when the ball hits the bat.鈥� But he warns young cricketers that they will
only develop this instinct after plenty of practice 鈥渨atching the ball鈥�.

Land and McLeod鈥檚 theory could have one flaw. Their batsmen faced a type of
bowling known as seam bowling, in which the ball travels straight until it
bounces. But the bowling machine used in the study was unable to simulate swing
bowling, where a fast bowler makes the ball swerve abruptly in mid-air before it
hits the pitch. This type of bowling is common in India and Pakistan, and in
baseball.

A batsman who doesn鈥檛 keep an eye on balls from a swing bowler would find
himself heading back to the pavilion sooner rather than later. While experienced
players rarely misjudge the length that a ball has been bowled, Tomlins says,
even they can be fooled by its lateral movement, or 鈥渓ine鈥�.