The above quote was taken from Paul Nixon, ex Leicestershire
and England wicket-keeper, who ran a course I attended this week on coaching
cricket to children. This proved to be a great day and credit must be given to
Paul for providing a fun, relaxed and stimulating course.
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| Paul Nixon in action for England |
Below are some of the take home
messages that I took from the day:
1 Being agile in cricket: the ability to fall, turn
and move quickly off the ground is central to any good cricketers match
preparation. Paul demonstrated this a lot while showing us wicket-keeping
drills and concluded that crickets need to be flexible and athletic enough
to put their bodies into sometimes awkward and challenging positions. Many of
the drills we completed were similar to gymnastic type
movements; children find gymnastics fun and it’s a great way to test our bodies
to move from one position to the next.
2 Head movement: Not just for wicket-keepers but for all
fielders this is a crucial take home message. For your body to move quickly
towards the ball your head moves first, this provides your central
nervous system with the information on where to go and how to get there. This
message can be relayed across all sports which require speed and agility; the
head moves first and the rest of the body follows.
3 Get into good habits early: For children, getting
into good habits early is fundamental for success. These habits can be in the
form of nutrition, match preparation, goal setting and balancing sport with
school work. However, Paul focused on warm ups in relation to this point.
Getting the children to jog round the pitch, have a few stretches and a few throw
downs is not preparing the child physically and mentally for competition.
Promote decision making and movement skills in a warm up, this
will get children into good habits early.
4 5 min of quality is better than an hour of rubbish nets:
This was a very important point which I’m sure is faced by every cricket coach
at some point, how do make net practise productive and worthwhile for the
children? Much net practise is of such low quality that it is almost worthless.
In some cases it can be damaging to technique by reinforcing bad
habits. The most worthless situation is having 6 boys in one net,
batting 10mins each in rotation, facing a mixed bag of bowling in rapid fire,
where bowlers are expected to bowl for the 50mins they are not batting. The
ideal number for a net is 3 or 4. This can be achieved, even if there are too
few facilities, by involving players in different forms of practise within the
same session. Treat nets like a circuit so that players have an opportunity to
be exposed to a variety of training situations.
5 ‘‘I have done 1.2 million squats in my career’’: Even for
someone who has played 23 years of professional cricket, this is a lot of
squats and therefore places a huge strain on the body. This quote highlights
the physical requirements of a wicket-keeper, but also reinforces a key concept
that alignment and control are vital in cricket. Therefore,
getting wicket-keepers doing endless amounts of squats because this is a common
movement pattern will not help their long term development. Teaching
correct posture, maintaining lower back and anterior/posterior muscle balance
however, will keep them on the pitch and not consistently needing massages or
rehab. Bowlers are very much the same, a huge amount of strain and
force is placed through the body, and because of this many bowlers are
lopsided and have uneven alignment. Placing more strain on the body in the form
of weight training and high repetitions will only increase the chances of
injury. Get the body aligned; get it moving well under control and then place
resistance upon it.
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| Athleticism and Cricket going hand in hand |
