This is an exclusive excerpt from the Countdown to Summer eBook available for instant download on PitchVision Academy.

Everyone knows how important goals are to success during the season. What if you could use the same idea to make your pre-season go with a bang too?

It's often overlooked that the run up to the summer needs clear goals too. You might not be scoring runs and taking wickets, but you still need a focus, and writing down your preseason goals provides that.

So take up your pen and paper and start planning your preseason too.

Here are the questions you need to ask to get your goals in place:

1. What are you good at and what do you need to improve?

All journeys need a starting point, so work out where you are now. Do you have a great technique but need to toughen up mentally?

Are you tactically weak and not streetwise enough?

Do you have the fitness levels you need?

Look at the whole picture: technical, tactical, mental, fitness and practice methods.

Write down the areas you are doing well and also the things you want to improve.

2. Where do you want to be at the start of summer?

The next question is how different you want to be by the start of the summer. You might need to go very intense at strength training to improve your power output, or you may be happy with that and just need to develop a better on drive.

You may not be able to do everything, but you do need a stake in the ground that says "this is where I want to be when I start playing again". Otherwise you are not going to know when you get there.

3. How are you going to get there?

Now we start getting into the meat of things: what exactly do you need to do. If you want a slower ball, how many balls are you going to have to bowl in the nets? How many times are you going to hit the gym? What mental preparation are you doing?

These are the goals themselves and you need to take care that you write them down in ways that mean you can track them. They need to be specific and measurable: "Being fit" is not a goal, but "being able to do 10 chin ups and bench press 80kg by April 26th" is a perfect goal (as long as it is realistic).

4. When are you going to check your progress?

The final thing to look at is when to review your goals. Some goals are easy to review (like weight lifted in the gym) and you can do it all the time. Others may need a bit more attention or specialist testing (like getting 90% accuracy with your stock ball), so factor in testing if you need it (but not too often, you don't want to spend all your time testing and training for a test, aim to be a well rounded player, not someone good at taking tests)

If you are doing well make your goals tougher, if you are doing poorly, ease back a bit.

The key is to challenge yourself while still being able to complete it. Too easy is just as useless as too hard.

By following these steps you will have the focus to hit the season running.

To read the rest of Countdown to Summer through an instant download, click here.