Every kind of wide, and why they differ by format

A wide is a delivery the batter could not reasonably have played from a normal stance. That definition sounds vague because it is, and the vagueness is why the same ball can be a wide in one format and a good ball in another.

The Law, and the discretion inside it

The Law asks whether the ball passed wide of where the striker was standing and out of reach of a normal cricket stroke. Two words are doing the work: normal and reach.

In a Test, an umpire applies that generously. A bowler is entitled to bowl a line outside off stump for hours; that is a plan, not an error. Leg-side wides are called more readily, because there is no legitimate reason to bowl there.

In white-ball cricket the same Law is applied strictly, and there are painted lines to help.

The tramlines

The wide guidelines on a limited-overs pitch are the two extra lines either side of the return crease. A ball passing outside the off-side line, with the batter in a normal position, is a wide.

They are guidelines rather than absolutes, because the Law still asks about reach. If the batter has walked across their stumps, the line effectively moves with them.

Leg side is stricter than off side, everywhere

Any ball down the leg side that the batter cannot play is a wide in every format, and the tolerance is far narrower than on the off side.

The asymmetry is deliberate. Off-side lines are a legitimate tactic; leg-side lines are almost always a mistake, and cricket has spent a century discouraging them. It is the same instinct that produced the leg-side fielding limit after Bodyline.

A ball down the leg side that the batter gets a touch on is not a wide. This is why keepers appeal so enthusiastically for the faintest glove.

Format by format

That last row surprises people. A no-ball usually brings a free hit in white-ball cricket. A wide never does, however badly it was bowled.

The bouncer that becomes a wide

A short ball passing above the batter's head, when they are standing upright, is called a wide in limited-overs cricket rather than a no-ball. Above shoulder height but reachable is usually neither.

The distinction depends on the competition's playing conditions, which is why commentators sometimes disagree with a call that is correct under that tournament's rules and would be wrong under another's.

The rule that saved bowlers from the reverse sweep

Until recently a batter could ruin a good delivery by moving. Shuffle two feet across to the off side as the bowler ran in, let a perfectly good ball pass where you used to be standing, and it was a wide down the leg side — a run and a rebowl for a ball the bowler had put exactly where they intended.

The Laws now judge the wide against where the batter was standing when the bowler began their run-up or bowling action, as well as where they ended up. If the ball would have been within reach at the original position, it is not a wide, however far the batter has since travelled.

This is one of the few law changes in the last twenty years that moved something back towards the bowler, and it did it without adding a judgement call: the umpire already watches the batter's position at that moment, because it is the same moment they check the front foot.

The batter keeps one protection. Movement before the bowler starts is allowed and counts as the original position — you can take guard two feet outside leg if you like. What you cannot do is start there, wait, and then move once the ball is on its way.

Wides on a free hit, and other combinations

A wide on a free hit is still a wide: a run, a rebowl, and the free hit continues. The same is true of a wide off a no-ball, which costs two runs — one for each — and is rebowled once.

The combinations get counted in a specific order and it is worth knowing which extras attach to whom.

Byes and leg byes are the pair people mix up with wides. Both are runs the batting side takes off a legal delivery that the bat did not hit, and neither is charged to the bowler. A ball that goes through to the keeper and is run is a bye. A ball that hits the pad and is run is a leg bye — provided the batter tried to play it or to avoid it, which is a genuine judgement the umpire has to make.

What it did to death bowling

The narrow white-ball tramlines changed how the last four overs are bowled, and not in the direction the lawmakers expected.

A yorker missed by six inches on the off side used to be a dot ball to a beaten batter. Now it is a wide: a run, and the ball again, to a batter who has just had a look at the bowler's best delivery. The margin for error on the most valuable ball in the format is smaller than the margin for error on the shot that answers it.

The response has been the wide yorker aimed inside the line rather than outside it, the slower bouncer, and the field set squarer. It has also produced a generation of bowlers who would rather be hit for four than concede a wide, because a wide gives the batter another attempt and a boundary does not.

How a wide becomes five runs

The ball is still live. If it beats the keeper and runs to the boundary, that is one for the wide plus four, recorded as five wides.

Batters can also run on a wide, and can be stumped or run out on one. A batter charging down the pitch, missing, and being stumped off a wide is dismissed — the wide is not a get-out clause.

For the other extra, see what counts as a no-ball. For how both appear on a scorecard, see how to read a scorecard.