Wicket

Much of cricket revolved around the bowler trying to get the wicket to look like the picture on the right, while the batsmen tried to keep it looking like the picture on the left. (TV: Black Orchid)

The wicket was the object of central focus in the sport of cricket. Comprised of three stumps and two bails, it was the thing that batsmen were guarding and the thing bowlers were attacking. Batsmen were dismissed if the bowler made the bails fall off the stumps by sending his ball past the batsman into the wicket.

Wicket was also a synonym for the cricket pitch itself, as Lord Charles Cranleigh made clear when he called the wicket on the Cranleigh Hall ground "green". (TV: Black Orchid)