Winter indoor nets

[chrisps]

It's the time of year (in northern hemisphere) that we head to sports halls to get ourselves primed for the season ahead. As a batsman, I love the intense 10 minutes of batting, facing ball after ball in quick succession. I also know that the indoor net behaves nothing like the pitches I'm going to be playing on in April, May - actually all summer, as I live in NW England; quicks don't have full run-ups; there's nobody on the boundary taking the catch, etc

I've blogged about some of my own netting experiences at: Winter nets Declaration Game

What do other CW users feel about indoor net practice?

[Bonnie Prince C]

My club's indoor nets do not take place in a massive hall, which I feel really does nothing for skill development ahead of the new season. As there is no room for individual skill training. However, I do feel that indoor nets do help for preparing for the new season. As a bowler it gets all your muscles used to bowling again, as a batsmen it allows you to get used to focusing on the ball again and you can do fitness work.

[Woodster]

I think winter indoor nets are a good way of getting everything moving again and getting used to the very basics of the sport, again. It is all condensed from the run-ups to the length of time allocated to each batsman, but it gets the arm over and the feet moving.

We try and think of ways of making it gradually more intense, flipping the mats over and creating a pitch that accepts helpful amounts of turn and use of the bowling machine in grooving a particular shot or working on a weakness. Like all nets though, I believe they should be used with focus and not just a social catch-up for players that may not have seen each other over the winter months.

We try and use an hour before the nets to do some much needed fitness work. As has been said, the batting conditions certainly do not replicate the wet, green tracks I anticipate in April time which is why a switch to outside training as soon as light allows is an important switch. Yet I guess the indoor nets serve a purpose, by the time outside training gets underway we should hopefully all be feeling a little less stiff and the feet will have been taken out of the winter cement, in theory.

[Neil Pickup]

^ That's how it works in my junior coaching session. At club, however...

I have, however, been batting pretty well all things considered. I've been trying to focus extra hard on picking the ball early and getting into position, and this is going alright: have been able to get forward when needed to all the bowlers in the 1st XI, and also have been able to pick up and work balls that are straight/legstump with more ease than ever before - hopefully this should mean fewer dead-bat dot balls and quicker starts to my innings in the summer.

Most irritatingly, however, I can't manage to control my bottom hand on the off (and particularly straight) drives, and I'm turning drive balls into hideous cowshots across the line. Need some time with the machine, I think.

[chrisps]

I really like the idea of flipping the mat over.

Has anyone tried having batsmen batting in pairs and running threes every 3 or 4 balls? The idea is to build in some speed work and get batters used to preparing themselves to face a delivery straight after a sprint.

[Cabinet96]

I practically train all year round thanks to indoor nets. Start in October and finish in early April. That does, however, make things feel a bit weird when you go outside as conditions are so different. I get to do quite a lot of fitness work in indoor training as well so that's good.

I'd say it gives me a real advantage when senior cricket starts as I'm in great touch and bowling to a guy who hasn't picked up a bat for 7 months.

Originally Posted by chrisps

I really like the idea of flipping the mat over.

Has anyone tried having batsmen batting in pairs and running threes every 3 or 4 balls? The idea is to build in some speed work and get batters used to preparing themselves to face a delivery straight after a sprint.

Yeah, where I train on the weekend we always bat in pairs and do running between the wickets. Usually only singles every 3 balls, but we sometimes step up the intensity. Last Saturday for instance we finished off by doing an over where we ran: 2, 2, 3, 2, 2 and 3.