What is a soft dismissal? Decoding the cricketing term

Cricket is not just a physical game but a game of strategy and tactics. The more the team devise a new strategy in clutch moments, the team is destined to come out on top against the opposition. Moreover, cricket is a sport that demands a high level of concentration and focus.

Even a lapse of concentration by one or two players could hamper the team’s success rate. Talking specifically about the batters, they need to concentrate keenly in order to read the bowlers’ deliveries. By doing so, they are able to judge the length and line of the ball so as to play shots accordingly.

If a batsman needs to take calculative risks in playing shots, he needs to be spot-on in terms of assessing the conditions. The cricket fraternity has seen batsmen getting dismissed due to a momentary lapse in concentration, also leading to ‘soft dismissal’.

What is a soft dismissal?

In the game of cricket, a soft dismissal means a batter getting dismissed by his own mistake rather than being outsmarted by the bowler. To be precise, it is a kind of dismissal wherein a batsman is pretty good at playing a particular shot but gets dismissed early on in the game due to a silly mistake.

Usually, this type of dismissal happens due to a sudden lapse in concentration and the other factors include shoddy shot selection or improper batting technique. For instance, Virat Kohli who has all the shots in his artillery, is known to play exquisite cover drives.

The former Indian skipper has played the cover drives on several occasions, which was a sight to behold. However, we have seen him getting dismissed by playing the shot early on in the game. Fast bowlers have often laid the trap by luring Virat Kohli to play a cover drive. However, Kohli would get an inside edge off his willow in the follow-through, leading to a soft dismissal which has happened several times in the past.

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