miCricketCoach reader and cricketer is a 14 year old all rounder who has already played for the UAE Under 15's, Young Talent Cricket Academy and Talent Cricket Club. In the future he plans on a long and illustrious International career. Follow his progress here. You can also find out what he is doing on his twitter page.

This week Shaaz gets a taste of professional fitness training at the UAE Under 17 Conditioning Camp.

Today was the first day of 'Conditioning Camp'. It was fitness and fielding related coordination, mental alertness and concentration drills.

There wasn't much of jogging (our training camps give more importance speed). However, we did lots of dynamic warm-up and most of the exercises were weird and new.

Once we were completely warmed up we did lots of sprints. The coaches timed each one of us, and told us where we stood compared to international standards. We did strengthening exercises, followed by lots of fielding drills.

The first drill was about team work -and it required you to call out players' names to ensure that you did what you were supposed. The other two were on mental toughness. You were supposed to catch the ball in confusing situations. We ended with a cool down.

I didn't get as much sleep as I would've wanted. My thighs, hamstring, back, shoulders: Yeah, it was paining everywhere! I had slept at 11:30 pm and woke up at 6 am to go to school. I had to stay back at school for an extra two hours to write a test. I managed to get some sleep in the evening. That relaxed my back tremendously (I slept with a pillow under my knee).

At the camp, after warm-up and sprints we started with more fielding drills.

We played a game (two teams) where you just kept on backing up and throwing at a single target stump. Then we did fielding and throwing underarm. We were taught the technique picking up the ball at the right spot (just in front of the outside of your right leg if you're right handed) and flicking the wrists (not swinging the arm)  to avoid wasting time. I also found it helpful to align myself with the stump as I ran in to pick the ball. We finished with a cool down.

I didn't manage to get enough sleep once again and had to make up for it in the evening. My back was fine, even though my thighs and hamstrings weren't.

The camp was more fitness. Instead of sprints we were made to do a drill where there were four cones, and three cones had balls placed on top. You just had sprint and place a ball on the empty cone three times until all the balls were on a new cone and then sprint back. We were all timed.

The coaches then showed us exercises we could at home to strengthen various parts of the body. They told us which parts of the body were used while playing cricket and how much was used.

Matches on both days. You can see how I did on my twitter page.

Photo credit: Seema KK

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