“It’s cricket with a smile.”

Those are the words of Jim Hyland, who is talking about indoor cricket in Gloucestershire, something he has been a big supporter of for many years.

The indoor version of this country’s number one summer-game has been very popular around the county for some three decades now, and its popularity shows no sign of waning.

Why would it? Playing indoor cricket means you can play the great game pretty much all the year round, particularly in the cold winter months, and as Hyland says: “What can be better than that?”

Hyland is the Gloucestershire Cricket Board’s indoor cricket coordinator and is a key player on the pitch as well as off it because he also plays for Whitminster in Division Two of the Cheltenham League.

The Cheltenham League is made up of 24 teams split evenly over four divisions while the Gloucester/Stroud League boasts another 17 teams who compete across two divisions. There are also another 20-plus teams competing in Bristol-based competitions.

The competitions, which also include a cup tournament and end-of-season play-offs, got under way at the beginning of October and are only now drawing to a close, which means they run for longer than the outdoor competitions in the summer!

The laws of the indoor game are similar to those outdoor - although there are obvious differences.

For a start, teams are made up of six players, who bowl 12 six-ball overs, with all the overs being bowled from one end.

“The ball is a bit lighter, 4.5oz instead of 5.5oz and made of different materials, but it does all the things a normal cricket ball does,” said Hyland. “If you can swing a ball it will swing, if you can spin a ball it will spin, if you can ‘seam’ a ball it will seam.”

The fact that the competition is played indoors – the Cheltenham League play their matches at the indoor cricket centre in Cheltenham and the Gloucester/Stroud League teams play at Gloucester Academy - also means the players need to use a different skill-set to the one they use in the great outdoors.

“The indoor game is played in a very small space,” said Hyland. “If you hit the back wall you can score a four or a six, but if you hit the side wall you score only one.”

The bonus of hitting the side wall is that you can also run as well so that a batsman can turn the one for hitting the wall into a three.

It all sounds quite straightforward but it’s not as easy as that, of course, as Hyland explains.

“It’s not all about hitting the ball as hard as you can,” he said. “If you hit the ball in the V, it’s very hard to get it past mid-on, mid-off and the bowler.

“And if you smash it to cover or midwicket and go for a run, the ball can bounce off the wall and a fielder may well run you out.

“You’ve got to use your head and play smart cricket, you need to mix it up and play delicate little shots into the gaps, create angles and spaces, manoeuvre the field to create the opportunity to then whack it over the top – that’s the essence of the game.

“It’s quite a thinking game – chess with people!”

The bowlers, too, have their work cut out with anything down the legside called a wide, and they are not given too much leeway on the offside either. The umpires are also eagle-eyed when it comes to no balls… unlike today’s Test match umpires it seems!

“Bowlers have to bowl with control,” added Hyland.

So, what is a good total in indoor cricket?

“Anything from 85 to 100, 100 is a good score,” said Hyland. “As you go down the divisions the scores can go up. The bowling and fielding in the top divisions is so sharp, you have to earn every run.”

It’s competitive in the highest divisions, of course it is, with the teams coming out on top of the leagues at the end of the season competing in play-offs to produce a county champion.

The county champions then enter the ECB National 6`s championship which can take them through to regional and national level, the finals of which are played at Lord’s.

Cheltenham Civil Service have been the most consistent team in Gloucestershire in recent times and will represent Gloucestershire in the regional finals in Taunton on 7th March when they will face a team from either Devon or Cornwall. No team from Gloucestershire has yet made it all the way to Lord’s, but Cheltenham Civil Service are just two wins away from being the first.

And while that is the aim for some, it’s certainly not the be-all and end-all for someone like Hyland, who also plays outdoor cricket for Whitminster.

“Everybody just seems to be happy to be involved in cricket in the winter,” he said. “It’s fantastically sociable and you get a lot of lads and dads playing together. There’s no angst or sledging that you sometimes get in the summer game.

“And because it’s a shorter game, it’s a great leveller. Everyone seems to enjoy it.”

That’s great news for the sponsors of course with the Cheltenham League sponsored by Display Refrigeration Limited and the Gloucester/Stroud League sponsored by Martin Berrill (Sports).

The competitions in the county are run by the GCB (Gloucestershire Cricket Board) and supported by GACUS (Gloucestershire Association of Cricket umpires and scorers) with qualified umpires and scorers appointed to all matches.

The game continues to go from strength to strength with the county now being able to boast three women’s indoor leagues too – the game really is for everyone.