Designing and adopting a coaching plan

What you need to do, and why

An essential element of an effective cricket coaching structure within secondary schools and cricket clubs is developing and implementing a coaching plan.

This can be completed by the coaching co-ordinator or development manager if your club is lucky enough to have one or by each Team coach.

A coaching plan is a written outline of your coaching programme for the season. It provides a broad overview of the season and may incorporate pre-season, during the season and end of season activities. It must take into account the facilities and equipment available for practice sessions and the Age, ability, and competitive level of your team or the teams in a secondary school or club.

A coaching plan usually comprises:

A calendar of practice sessions and matches

A set of Core skills, that cover the essential generic game and Team needs you have identified, together with a list of appropriate drills to develop these. These skills need to be prioritized, the divided and spread through your coaching plan. These core skills and drills can then be used as the basis of your weekly practice sessions. Implementing such a programme ensures that fundamental batting, bowling, fielding, wicketkeeping and tactical skills crucial for success in cricket are targeted and developed in all players, thus giving them a sound foundation on which to build

A practice plan for each practice session detailing the type of practice, objectives, facility and equipment requirements, introduction and warm up, skill development in terms of which skill will be focused on and drills will be used, cool down and conclusion including match arrangements (eg opposition, venue, start time, travel details) and evaluation. Initially these may focus on generic game and team needs but as the season progresses more specific game, team and player needs will be included.