Oh definitely! It makes reviewing photos afterwards a pain, but it's definitely worth it. Never could have gotten anywhere near as many good shots without it—or even with burst mode on my older D3100 which only burst about 3 photos per second.
3D is what Nikon called “tracking” on their DSLR bodies. It tracks your subject as it moves around somewhat decently. I’m not sure how well it works on a D7500 with lots of potential subjects, but the idea is that you put the focus box over your intended subject, engage tracking, and the camera will follow the subject around as it moves
Do not use auto area, 9 point, etc because you’re going to want to control where the camera is focusing when there are lots of people on the field. Most cameras will generally go for the closest subject, but the action point could be behind them.
Ah yeah thanks! This is precisely the sort of advice I was looking for.
What lens are you using? You’re going to want a decent amount of reach. I’m a big fan of the Nikon AF-S 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 VR on a crop body and used it for many years on my D5300.
55–200 f/4.0–5.6, and while I wouldn't mind a faster or faster-focusing lens, I think that's the perfect focal length for what I'm doing. I took a decent chunk of 55–69 mm photos, and while the 200 mm photos sometimes would have benefited from an even longer focal length, it wasn't so bad that cropping in post isn't viable. I'm not producing wall-sized prints! A 70–300 would be perfect if my camera were full-frame though. But here I'm trying to shoot a football-type sport and I'm able to get a metre or two from the sideline.
I've tried shooting cricket a couple of times, and there I'm pretty sure even 450 mm (35 mm equivalent) wouldn't be sufficient. A field can be easily 90+ m across with the pitch right in the centre, and even at an amateur level the players don't usually like you being directly in front of where the batsman's facing.
Assuming your lens is sharp wide open, set your camera to S and let the camera manage ISO and aperture as needed
I'm actually thinking M with auto-ISO might be the way to go in the future, to lock the shutter speed nice and fast and force it to keep the lens open, but still react well to when the play goes under shadow. The wide aperture is more necessary for style than for light though, because the sun is super bright.
Anyway, thanks a heap for all the advice there. It's very helpful!