“The Magnificent Seven” is a drill that you can do with a variety of feed options dependent on the level of experience and skill of the cricketer that you are working with at the time.

The Magnificent Seven can be done against bobble feeds, throw downs, bowling machines or against bowlers.

The aim is in two stages,

1. Use your feet and hit successfully (with good contact, balance and outcome) with a drive shot. When you have successfully hit two of these you can then move on.
2. Use any combination of sweep options until you have hit five successful shots.

Keep a count of the number of balls its takes you to reach the Magnificent Seven. The lower the score, the better.

Once you have your initial score, you can be internally competitive and beat or match your previous score. Or, you can be externally competitive to see how you rank against players in your team.

• If you achieve the Perfect Magnificent Seven then can you repeat it?
• If you achieve the Perfect Magnificent Seven then can you achieve the same thing against a more advanced feed option?
• If you achieve a consistent Perfect Magnificent Seven then can you do it against a different spin type or a different angle.

The Perfect Magnificent Seven Player would be able to score all of the different feed options and all the different spin and angle options.

Now that would be a highly skilled player wouldn’t it?

Here is Charlie Clist doing his “Magnificent 7” game this morning against Tom Bevan.

Charlie has worked so hard on his set up over the in his first few weeks in the programme. It’s been great to see him develop. Charlie chooses to hit only hard sweeps as his option presently, which is fine for the stage that we are at in his programme. When we do this at a later stage in the year he will have learnt how to execute some other sweep options within the Magnificent Seven to put even more pressure on opposing captains and bowlers. Great stuff from Charlie here.

Variations

Whilst I have chosen two shots (to similar length of ball) as this week programmed Magnificent Seven you could choose two other shot options if you like. It’s a highly transferable drill.

You could also change the weighting of the shots. I have gone with 2 down the pitch drives and 5 sweeps (any type of sweep works for me this week in the programme). I leave it to you on that one.

With the younger players, I have given them the option to either hit the ball along the ground or in the air when they use their feet. This helps the ones that aren’t as physically developed at early ages. It enables them to be successful at the drill and also be competitive against players who are more senior in age or more physically mature.

With the senior cricketers, I ask them to clear the inner ring by a considerable distance before they count their used feet drive as a success. The senior group are policing their own shots with real honesty and precision. It’s been great to see.

What is deemed a successful shot?

The less experienced players may need some help in assessing the quality of the shot at the outset, they soon pick up on the acceptable quality levels with a bit of guidance.

We have a Leaderboard in the cricket bubble which has all the players on it. What it doesn’t say is how old the player is nor how strict the “using feet” constraint is.

But what it does allow is for and individuals internal and external competition driver to be rewarded by having their magnetic name tag move up the leaderboard after their hard work pays off.