What goes into becoming an excellent spinner? It's a question raised recently by this article looking at what England need to do to improve their spin stock. What can you learn from these ideas to take into your spin bowling?

I have regular conversations with parents and players about their cricket development (or lack of it). Some of those conversations are instigated by the parent or the player yet I would say that over 70% are arranged by the coaching staff at Millfield.

This is part three of a series on how to captain in the field. To go to part one click here. To go back to the introduction click here.

Along with bowling changes, field placing is the other obvious part of captaincy in the field.

The simple way to look at it is to put the fielders where you think the ball is most likely to go (not always just where it has gone).

How do you do that without resorting to the stock fields that everyone uses?

Before we get into that, a word about orthodox fields: They are orthodox because they have been proven to work over the test of time. Slips remain in place because batsmen through the ages continue to edge the ball wide of the wicketkeeper. Mid on and mid off exist because even the most extreme Twenty20 specialists play shots with a straight bat sometimes.

That said it's important not to mindlessly follow what you consider the norm. Just because every captain in your club starts the game with a couple of slips, a gulley and a saving one field it does not mean you should.

For the basic theory of field placing take a look at my article here.

Once you have that in your mind, let's go back to the basic aim of field placing: Putting your players where you think the ball will go.

It was the summer of 2009. My club side had romped to victory in the league.

I could not have had a more demotivating season.

In fact, I was more motivated a couple of seasons later when the same side finished dead bottom of the division and were on the opposite side of weekly drubbings.

I'm not crazy.

It's a common situation because motivation is about far more than how you do as a player or a team.

When you know this, you can make changes to stay motivated through the whole year, even when things are not going as planned.

Go to nets, do your drills and play cricket. These are the steps to improving your skills. But how much time does it really take to make it as a cricketer?

One answer looked at in the last 10 years is 10,000 hours: A number plucked off the back of a study into top class violists, and popularised by authors like Malcolm Gladwell and Geoff Colvin. The idea has since been expanded to cricket. People have stated that simply training every day for 10 years will take you to of the cricket tree.

Hard work, yes, but you know what you need to do. It's been proven by science.

I got 10,000 problems

Except, in recent times, the headline of "10,000 hours" has demotivating to people who play club and school cricket. Most of us can't dedicate so much time to the game. If you train, on average, four hours a month, mastery will take 208 years!

Train hard; get better. Do your drills. It's a simple mantra, but it's missing a crucial part of the process of practice to improve. Cricketing technique, tactics and mental strength require one more "drill".

Review.

By thinking of review as a drill, and reflecting on your practice and games, you will get better faster. You will even get better between practice sessions. It works by giving you a feedback loop that has been proven to boost skills faster than anything else. It gives direction to your training, encouragement that things are working and confidence that you can repeat the right skill at the right time.

Yet, most of us don't bother much with it.

Nomaan sent in a great question to the Pitchvision Cricket Show last week. It revolved around his lack of confidence, increased anxiety levels and being unable to transfer his considerable practice skills into a match context.

Ultimately he had lost "that loving feeling" for the game.

One of the biggest problems faced by cricketers is the nerves before playing. But what if I told you worrying in the right way is perfect for getting you through a tough game?

We all worry, and that worry is usually fearing the worst. Everyone has had the moment where they wonder if they will get out first ball. It's usually around the time you are in next. It's uncomfortable and it makes you nervy at the crease, stopping you play your natural game.

So, switch the worry to focus on what you can do instead.

You can still worry, it's just you can make it productive instead of being filled with panic.

Whatever your style as a batsman, you can't use it as an excuse.

If you are a big hitter and you get out in a tight run chase trying to clear deep midwicket, you can't shrug and say "it's the way I play".

If you are a naturally cautious batsman there is no excuse for making the middle order have to take risks because you have wasted balls at the top of the order.

Some might say it's selfish batting.

I was having a chat with one of our first team players last night and he mentioned the idea of "training upwards". What was he talking about?

Currently, the team I coach is having trouble with the bat. There have been no first team fifties despite being 10 weeks into the season. However, the other two senior teams and the under 18 side are doing much better, with good averages for several guys.

This problem is where the idea of "training up" was hatched.