What do you think about formal testing at your level?

There is no doubt that testing players is a great tool. You can see a measurable improvement in all kinds of areas from fitness to cricket skills. But it's not used that often outside of the professional game.

Is it a cultural thing?

Certainly here in the UK there is a philosophy in club and school cricket that you are taking things "too seriously" if you run a formal test. So, it never gets done.

Maybe it's a time and resources thing.

If you are a coach in India with an Academy where 200 kids turn up for nets, it's a challenge to do any kind of relevant standardised testing. It's much easier to get a few drills going while others head to the nets.

But both these reasons seem a little lame.

It's easy to test players and the results are increased motivation when you see results improving. The fact is that there are lots of ways to test and you can adapt testing to your needs.

You could follow the example of the DPL and do formal testing with PitchVision integrated into nets. There is hardly any work needed there: just start bowling and batting and monitor the results.

You could do a simple test of fitness by seeing how many chin ups and press ups everyone can do. Test again a few weeks later. For players with a personal commitment to the gym, you can ask them to test themselves.

You can test speed with a running between the wickets competition.

BATEX is an even better tool for running/batting performance testing.

So, what would you like to test, and how can you go about it? Leave a comment and let me know.