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

Spin bowlers are game changers; the likes of Shane Warne, Muttiah Muralitharan and Anil Kumble have all show this. But there will be days when things don’t go to plan.

How can you maintain a good performance or turnaround the bad day?

Does it sometimes feel like you are cursed to make no progess with your cricket?

Like India's post-2011 World Cup slump of Test hammerings and World Twenty20 failure you can feel that - despite all your hard work - you have lost your ability.

You are stuck in a rut and it can feel like a disaster.

That feeling you had when you were a master of the game has gone. Your confidence is shot which puts you into a spiral of worse play and no idea how to get out it.

And as for progress, well, you can't even tred water, let alone improve.

Virender Sehwag is more than an opening batsman. Through his astounding achievements he has come to represent an attitude to batting.

That attitude has both been praised and admonished as simple yet irresponsible.

Batting is not a complex tactical and technical mix to Sehwag. He see's every ball in every situation as a chance to score runs. Ideally a boundary but he will take less if he must.

Psychologist columnist Karl Stevenson tells us why it's time to forget about the textbook when it comes to batting.

Here is an over-rated phrase:

"That shot is straight out of the textbook!"

The truth is that in the modern era of cricket we hear it less and less. It's no longer relevant, if it ever was.

My problem with the textbook starts with three simple questions; if we look at these questions, we uncover the fundamentals of how batsmen really develop a successful technique.

Playing cricket is a show.

Even when India are playing meaningless warm up matches before the World T20, millions are gripped to the outcome. The fans don't want to see a workmanlike, efficient performance either.

We want drama and showmanship.

We want players who can do things about which we only dream.

And it's exactly the same at your level; you have to put on a show. It's the only way to raise the roof.

When Sachin Tendulkar was bowled for 17 in the 2nd Test against New Zealand he did something unusual.

Normally the Little Master walks off quietly, thoughtfully and focused.

This time he swung his bat in frustration.

Sounds like a tiny change?

Yes, but it shows something from which we can all learn as batters.

Only he can know what made the difference, but it showed a crack in the temperament of one of the greatest batsmen of all time.

In a brand new column, psychologist Karl Stevenson looks at the crucial mental side of cricket. This article debunks the myth of mental toughness...

In and amongst cricketing circles you may have many citing the importance of ‘mental toughness’. However, when asked about what mental toughness is and why it is important, people begin to falter.

They reel off a few generic terms, such as ‘determination’ or ‘motivation’.

While important, these do not automatically make a player mentally tough.

Menno Gazendam is author of the popular Spin Bowling Project.

Here's a question I got from a reader;

"I don’t get much bowling opportunity in the game. And when I do, one mistake and I am off".

This is a very common complaint.

If you had to put cricket into one word, what would you choose?

Some say it's about angles. Others talk about hand-eye coordination, or athleticism. All those things are important but I would choose a different word.

Culture.

It's one of those words that get banded about in sport and in business as an explanation for everything. Champions are pinned with the tag of having a winning culture, losers have the failure mentality.

It makes you wonder how you can emulate a winning environment.

Critics look at the word and scoff. They rightly point out that sides with a winning 'culture' also always seem to have incredibly talented players. They argue that culture doesn't exist outside individual abilities.