Cow Corner Explained — The Fielding Position and the Big Shot

Cow corner is the area of the outfield behind and to the leg side of the batter — roughly between deep midwicket and deep square leg, where the boundary curves at roughly 45 degrees to the left of a right-handed batter. It has one of cricket's most evocative names, and a specific modern significance in T20 cricket.

Where cow corner is

Standing behind the batter and looking from the bowling end: cow corner is the arc behind and to the leg side, approximately where a deep midwicket would stand but shifted further behind the crease. On traditional county grounds, this area was often in a corner of the ground that backed onto grazing land — the 'cow corner' — because batters rarely hit there intentionally, and so it was not considered a prime fielding position.

The cow corner shot

In T20 cricket, the cow corner has become a target. The slog sweep — a cross-bat swipe at a length ball, aimed over the leg-side boundary — sends the ball into the cow corner arc. Batters who can clear the rope to cow corner add a dimension that is very hard to set a field against, because defending it means pulling a fielder from a more productive off-side position.

Fielding at cow corner

In T20 cricket, captains often post a deep fielder in the cow corner area when facing batters who favour the slog sweep. The position is typically called 'deep midwicket' or 'deep square leg' on scorecards, but commentators and players use 'cow corner' to describe the specific arc. Batters who can hit over cow corner consistently — MS Dhoni, Shimron Hetmyer, Liam Livingstone — are extremely valuable in the death overs because setting a field to stop them elsewhere opens up the cow corner, and vice versa.