Many of the leading Cricket nations now use "Talent Testing" for 13 and upwards as a part of their talent identification process. I want to show you how to use some of these tests in your coaching.

Here is the first of the talent test drills that you can use to test players and then provide feedback that improves performance. What's not to love?

If you want to understand how deep passions run for cricket in Mumbai, just go to an Academy and watch young cricketers desperate for a chance to be the next Tendulkar.

But an Academy that has little success rarely lasts long. To succeed, the coaches need to have an even deeper passion than their charges. They need to be mindful and knowledgeable.

A few weeks ago I was asked to do a session with a top class player who had lost his 'mojo' against spin.

When I asked him to tell me about his plans for our time together he said,

"I don't want to feel shotless when the ball spins, don't want to feel as if I am going to nick it to slip or short leg and I don't want to be stuck in the crease".

Becoming the Ranji Trophy’s highest ever run scorer takes relentless patience. You learn to bat the opposition out of the game by waiting and picking off the weak bowling.

Amol Muzumdar, who is in a see-saw competition with Wasim Jaffer to finish with the highest run tally, knows his game in this way. He has a strategy and he sticks to it.

But what if you are just starting out as a batter; how do you learn to play your own way and emulate this success in professional cricket?

Serious Cricket have teamed up with PitchVision Academy to provide online cricket coaching from some top name coaches.

To celebrate the launch of the first course, Batting with Toby Radford we are giving away a free video on how to play the back foot defence.

Slower balls and speed variations are important now more than ever where pitches are so flat that conventional swing bowling has a limited window of impact.

Here are 3 variations, as demonstrated by bowlers who have become masters of the slower ball.

This is a guest article from coach and PhD candidate Adam Kelly.

The traditional image is that coaching is about developing the techniques of batting, bowling and fielding.

But another way to define coaching is, 'performance-improvement technique'. So coaches should use any technique that enhances performance.

Using psychological techniques in your coaching will enhance the learning curve of your athletes. Here are several methods you can add to your coaching:

Coaching takes a focus as the team talk through the importance of how to coach, as well as what to coach. We discover one of the best ways to keep your coaching process fresh and interesting to players.

We also discussing using tablets like the iPad and smartphones like the iPhone as coaching tools, and the role of temperament in different formats. It promotes a wide ranging discussion!

It's no secret that it's easy to struggle against spinners in the Sub-continent. England's batsmen have failed for decades.

Here is the inside guide to playing spin in slow, low turning conditions so you can coach your players to be a little more like Dravid.

This is a guest article from Darren Talbot: professional coach, Managing Director of Darren Talbot Cricket Coaching and founder committee member of the Surrey ECB Coaches Association.

The Australian great Glenn McGrath built an amazing career on consistency.