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Playing to get fit not getting fit to play. If you want to get the best out of your cricket performance you need to play cricket. However, you also need to be ready to play cricket by being strong, fast, agile and have good movement skills. These are transferable fitness skills that provide you with a base to put your cricket skills on top. The best way to get there is via a functional sport training plan. This can be as simple as a couple of bodyweight training sessions a week or as complex full year plan.
Ab Crunches. Crunches are used for fitness more out of tradition than any functional reason. You need to forget about trying to isolate muscles in the front of your stomach and work your whole core. We are trying to train movements and efficiency not individual muscles. Core training will not only give you great looking abs but great functioning ones. Drop the crunches and try planks, medicine ball throws and twisting movements.
Skipping Breakfast. Whether it is through being in a rush or trying to lose weight, many players skip their waking meal. This is counter productive in a couple of ways. First, studies have shown that people who skip breakfast tend to eat more during the day to compensate and when they do eat they get a larger insulin spike that combines with the extra calories to help you put on weight. Second, you are not fuelling your body for the day. This is vital every day, but even more important on a matchday where you will need energy in a good, steady supply.
Jogging. Jogging is good for the health of your heart and lungs but not for your cricket. A long, slow jog quickly turns to a slog and not many cricketers enjoy it anyway. Worse still, regular jogging has been shown in studies to reduce your body's ability to produce fast, powerful movements. Interval training is far more cricket specific, takes less time and gives your heart a good workout.
Back Squats. Again, used in the right context a barbell squat with the bar across your back is a great exercise for building strength. However, I rarely recommend the exercise as it is very easy to put on too much weight and stress your back with poor technique. A combination of front squats, hip extension exercises and single leg work is much more specific to sport and safer for most people.
Avoiding Fish Oil. If you hate â€˜supplements' or love them, the one thing every person (not just cricketers) should have in their diet is Essential Fatty Acids (EFA) or fish oil. This has been proven to help with both performance and general health: Increased carbohydrate storage in muscles, improved glucose and insulin tolerance, reduced blood lipids and reduced risk of platelet aggregation, cardiovascular disease, cancer and diabetes. You can get it from oily fish like salmon or fresh tuna (not tinned) or you can buy it in capsules from health food shops.
Stretching Before Play. Stretching in your warm up is another tradition that has hung on despite a great deal of research to prove otherwise. Stretching is a good thing to do after play, but before a game or training you are reducing your muscle's ability to contract quickly and may even increase the risk of injury. As throwing, running, bowling and playing shots all require quick contractions you would be best avoiding the stretches and do a dynamic warm up instead.

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