After another demolition of India this weekend, England’s cricket team are now the number 1 test team in the world. How have they done it? What’s the secret to their success, that silver bullet that perhaps we can apply to our athletes? I’ve been doing some deep thinking, research and analysis and I think I have it. Over the next few paragraphs I’m going to divulge those secrets. For only £25 you too can learn the secrets to success….ok, that bit’s a joke unless you do want actually want to pay, then please get in touch.

Now I’m sure a lot of commentators and writers will talk about the cyclical nature of the sport and the dissipation of a great Australian team and the coming to an end of a very good Indian team. Those though are external factors not under the control of the England team, I’m going to concentrate on things they have done themselves. So timing of development, for me, isn’t the secret of their success.

One thing the England team does do is work very hard. On all aspects of their game. Their fielding, batting, bowling, psychological skills and their conditioning. They work hard at all of them. Secret 1 is hard work.

The other thing the England team does is that they work hard over a long period of time, they do it consistently. Not just for a couple of weeks or a single series. They work hard, consistently. Secret 2 is consistency.

There we have it. Apologies if it’s not what you wanted to hear or you were expecting a quick and easy solution to make it to the top. There isn’t one. For coaches, athletes or anyone who wants to get better at something, your silver bullet solution is consistent hard work.

I had a little spare time over the weekend and took the chance to watch one of the Indian Premier League cricket matches. The one thing that struck me, aside from the seemingly huge improvement in cricket bat technology over the past few years, was just how hard the game appeared.

The matches are played at a high tempo, the over rate makes sure of that, increasing the demand on the fast bowlers in particular. The conditions looked punishing, the effects of the heat and humidity were very apparent on all players and the batsmen who spent some time at the crease. The weight of the bats is around the 3lb mark for most players and the high intensity of the shots played, namely big aerial strokes, along with the quick running and high over rate also take their toll. In order to stay at the crease, shot selection and execution are vital and gets more difficult when fatigued. Similarly, when a bowler begins to tire, mistakes are made and more runs are scored. Conditioning is a fundamental aspect of the game now, perhaps not so much for those playing longer forms of the game but anyone who’s batted for a long time on a hot summers day knows the impact of fatigue and should be able to pick the positives effect that conditioning will have.

The only issue that may arise, speaking from experience of cricket dressing rooms, is that not all cricketers are enthralled at partaking in those kinds of sessions. There is plenty of opportunity to utilise use the imagination, and selling it as skills under fatigue and still giving sessions a technical focus can be a good way around the issue.

I don’t know if it’s part of a directive put out by the International Cricket Council in order to make test cricket more interesting or if the strength and conditioning coaches of the test playing nations all read the same book, but there must some reason behind it.   A common site on the morning of a test match is the site of players from both sides undertaking their warm ups, which usually include some mobility exercises, fielding drills, some batting, some bowling…..and a game of football, rugby or australian rules football.  Now, it’s that last part that I have issues with.   I’m all for using some cross over training with teams and squads to benefit movement skills, coordination or reactive ability during match performance.  It can also break up the monotony of training.   The question I would ask is where the benefit is of playing a game of football on the morning of a test match, particularly in arguably the most intense test series around?

For one, I don’t see where the transfer of skills to cricket is apart from maybe playing in goal where reactions/catching are tested, please feel free to enlighten me.  At least australian rules and rugby have a large catching element to it and may aid hand eye coordination.  Instead, with the England team we have a group of athletes partaking in a game they are not conditioned for, that can include some very stressful multiplanar movements and has the added risk of injury through trauma.  How about a dead leg to your opening bowler during an innocuous tackle?  An accidental trip and a broken wrist for a key batsman?   All possible, especially when you add in the fact that all participants are professional sportsmen who are, by their very nature, incredibly competitive.

I recognize that a warm up for a cricket match isn’t easy to design, particularly given it generally occurs before the toss and you don’t know if the majority of the players will even get onto the pitch during the day’s play.  On match day however, my preference would be to keep the mind on cricket and maybe to look at using drills that are very cricket specific and involve a progressive intensity, particularly on the reactive and psychological focus side which would benefit both batsmen and fielders and not be dependent upon the toss.   Once the toss is won, players go through their pre-match psych routines, bowlers a slightly more movement specific set of patterns and we’re off.

Matt Prior may or may not have been injured as a result of the warm up game, but either way it’s then a lot to weigh upon the mind of your Andrew Strauss.  He then has to contemplate Paul Collingwood as wicket keeper and approach Ricky Ponting to ask about delaying the toss and allow a call up of a replacement keeper from a county game.   He then misses his warm up and mental preparations, the rest of the team don’t even know who’s playing (imagine what’s going through Paul Collingwood’s mind) and the dressing room and surrounding areas appear more akin to the deck of the Titanic than cricket changing room.   The players can’t help but be distracted by these external goings on and their mental preparation is disrupted.   Throw that on top of a fire alarm and the whole team outside the hotel at 0430 and you have some of the worst preparation imaginable.  102 all out seems about right after all that.