BATTING : Improved Running Between the Wickets

Can you imagine this at Manchester United's training ground:

Sir Alex Ferguson: "Robin! What are you doing?"

Robin van Persie: "Practicing my free-kicks Boss"

Sir Alex Ferguson: "Are you mad? You know that we don’t allow that! You're only allowed to take free kicks in matches. But make sure you don’t miss."

Of course no football coach (let alone the greatest ever) would stop a player from practicing something so important.

Yet this is precisely what cricket coaches all round the world do on a daily basis with running between the wickets.

Running requires several skills to be developed, all of which are significant in their own right and need to be developed in order to maximise individual and team performance:

a) Judgement of ball pace, direction and angle

b) Spatial awareness

c) Fielder's mobility, pace, throwing accuracy and throwing power

d) Verbal and non-verbal communication

e) Line and speed of running

f) Stopping, turning and restarting technique

To develop these skills, I have encouraged the development of 3 patterns every time that they execute a shot in nets.

We do this even if working 1 to 1 with only the bowling machine or my sidearm delivering the ball.

1. Motor Pattern

Hit and look to run always.

A couple of colleagues of mine are experts in body and mind connections in sport. They have a saying that we need to "move to think". Not only that, they can prove it too.

So, I have taken this on board and we now ask each batter to move after contact to aid their Judgement which informs their decision making.

This comes in the form of a step through after each shot (even defending) and goes all the way through to net sessions where full singles, 2s and 3s are run just as they would in the game.

2. Cognitive Pattern

Now, the players are combining their understanding of where fielders are with the development of their motor patterns post-strike with stunning results.

Decisions are made quicker, the incidence of the players making poor decisions is lessening and the connection between movement and decision making is highly evident in the number of times that "stolen single" is being hit on our match analysis system.

3. Verbal Pattern

Players are encouraged to call with the same tone and volume in nets as they do in matches.

Every ball.

They may feel silly the first time they do it yet as the culture develops, they start of feel the odd one out if they are not calling loudly.

Consequence training

In net sessions with 1 player (1 to 1) we have 60 ball practices.

Every time a batter fails to move post-strike or call effectively the balls remaining total number drops by 10. The session ends at 0 balls irrespective of time left in the session.

In scenarios or nets with 2 batters any failure to move and call means the loss of the strikers wicket.

This increases the chances of the scenario being lost. Scenarios always start with only 3 wickets remaining so the loss of a silly run out through lack of engagement is often fatal.

These consequence sessions train the brain and boy to work optimally on a part of the game that we all do, every time we bat.