Cricket Fielding Drills

Cricket... What a good sport... Imagine it without fielders, just go on, try to imagine it without fielders... That's right. Without fielders catching the ball, it would be a one-sided game,  with one team always winning the game. How boring!

So as you know, fielding is key in cricket. The quicker the ball gets caught in air, the less runs the batsmen are likely to make. This makes fielding as important as tyres on any vehicle. Pointless without them. We have created a list of the best possible fielding drills which you can do to improve your fielding experience!

Catch Volleyball

This might be a hard to understand and set up drill, but it is the most effective. It is not just catching, but trying to throw it at a target too. To set this up, you need 3 teams (4-5 players in each are fine, no need for any more).

One of the teams makes a line in the middle, next to each other. The other 2 spread across the playing field in their respective side of the pitch. One of the teams starts off with the ball and throws it towards the other team. Basic volleyball rules apply, except for, the ball needs to be held by the player, then returned and not like in volleyball. When the ball is not caught and it hits the ground, the team that last threw it gets a point. 

In addition to this, the middle team can try to intercept and catch the ball. When this happens, the middle team will be playing in the position of the team which threw the ball before they caught it. This carries on for as long as you want. It should be at least 10 minutes, and you can use this as a warm up drill,, before proceeding to another drill.

Catching Drill

I have mentioned this drill before, in my catching drills. This very simple and effective drill tests the player's reactions and accuracy. This is the easiest to set up in this list and it only requires at least 2 players. 

To set this up, you place 2 cones at your chosen distance and have 2 players stand behind them. The cones must be at a straight line, opposite to each other. Give one of the players a ball and have them throw, so the other player catches. You could set this up so that the players are close together and they make underarm throws, or that they are far away and make more powerful, overarm throws. Or, even better, you could have them closer together t the start, then gradually move them further away from each other. 

This could also be converted into a competition to have all players engaged. To do this, you need more people, it could be your friends and family. Have them throw and catch, if a throw is misplaced and the player is unable to catch, they are out of the game. The last one surviving wins. An alternative to this is to have them throw as many throws as possible in a given time (such as 60 seconds). To make this a harder training set, you could have them close together when you start and gradually increase the distance between them. This is not just fun, but it trains your catching ability, because lets face it, sooner or later you need to be a fielder in the realms of cricketing.

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Cricket Drills - Grips

Bowling is the most important fundamental of cricket. But it isn't that straight forward, there are a lot of things that are behind the scenes. Very often you see replays of bowlers bowling balls over and over again. What you don't see however is the way bowlers have their grips. These grips might be complicated, but we've tried to make their tutorials amazingly simple, so that even kids and beginners can master these properly.

Away Swing Bowlers Grip

This is a grip for right handed people, who throw the ball outwards and the ball curves in air, away from the body of a right handed bowler. To preform this powerful technique you need to know how to grip the ball. The process is simple but requires a few tweaks, which vary from individual to individual.

The first thing you need is to place your index and middle fingers on either side of the seam on the cricket ball. Your thumb lies at the bottom, in the middle and the remaining fingers (ring and pinky), need to fold in the palm of your hand. It is also very important to have a distance of a finger between the ball and your palm.

You need to hold the ball just right, this can be the trickiest bit, and where you need to tweak to your personal style. You don't want to hold the ball too loosely or tightly, as you won't be able to have control of the ball's projection and, or the ball won't roll out of your fingers as easily. 

Fast Bowl Grip

This is a grip for those who want to be able to throw the ball at a fast pace to try and trick the batter. This is actually very similar too the away swing bowlers grip. You hold the ball by placing your index and middle fingers on either side of the seam on the cricket ball. Your thumb lies at the bottom, in the middle and the remaining fingers(ring and pinky), need to fold in the palm of your hand.

You will also need to have a finger's distance between your palm and the ball. This is important as if you hold the ball too loosely, you will lose all of the control in the ball. Alternatively, if you hold the ball too tightly then the ball won't roll out of your fingers the way it's supposed to.

This is where the difference comes in between this and the above grip. As you are about to throw the ball, make sure that your wrist is cocked back and locked in place. This is so that when you let go of the ball, it will have a backspin in it, which can cause batsman problems and help you win the game.

Bowl Leg Spin Grip

Leg Spin might be one of the hardest drills to master compared to others, but a good leg spin has the ability to get plenty of wickets. This involves turning the ball off the pitch from the leg side of the right handed batsman to the offsite from right to left.

You need to grip the ball very differently for this. The index, middle and ring fingers need to be well spread out across the seam, not on the sides of the seam as in the above grips. Your pinky and thumb are not involved at all in this grip

You need to flip your wrist, so the palm is facing upwards just before releasing. This will allow the ball to have a spin, so it can turn. Your aim should be towards the outer most stump. Your arm as you are sniping it before releasing should be completely straight, if it's bent, then there will be a fault and your throw won't be counted

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Cricket Drills - Bowling

Bowling is key. I mean, if it wasn't for the bowlers, then the batters would always get a win. As a bowler it is your role to make sure you can get the batter out. There are ways to do this, including getting caught, LBW, run out, hit wicket, amongst many others. Here, we've put together a few drills to take you from nothing to everything. Before you actually start bowling the ball, you need to know how to hold the cricket ball, you can check out the different hand grips by clicking here.

Hitting a Target

A rather simple yet effective start to bowling is 'hitting a target'. This is set with at least 3 people, a wicket keeper, a fielder and as many bowlers as you want. You will also need to have wickets and some kind of a reference point. This could be a tape, rope, or anything which can be quickly referenced to. The set up is also surprisingly simple.

Have the wicket keeper behind the wickets and get a bowler to bowl the first ball. The fielder uses the reference point to find out if the bowler threw the ball at a good line and a good length. After the bowler is done, then its the next bowler's turn and so on. You could make this more of a fun activity by giving points to the bowlers for getting a good line or length. You could even give them a time limit each and have a reward for the winner.

Double Target Practice

This is a modification to the target practice. As the name suggests, there are 2 targets instead of one. This is to have and improve your ability to adjust your line and length. To set this up, you place 2 targets, which could be 2 stomps. 

The bowler then makes a throw and aims to hit one of the targets, then the bowler throws another ball straight away, but this time aims at the second target. The bowler keeps on changing the target to be hit. You could make this more challenging by changing the distance between the targets after some time. This will keep the drill more challenging and the bowler will actually improve more this way.

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Cricket Drills - Kids

Who said that cricket was for adults? Kids are kids today, but stars of the next generation. If you don't train them today, they won't do anything for the rest of their lives. Cricket is a great sport for them to connect with each other and doesn't just improve their physical skills, but also their social skills.

We've pit together a great list of drill that are kids friendly and they are super effective, and will make them not just a better player, but also a better person in general.

Reflex Catching

This is to get in the mood of playing cricket. I guess you could call this a warm up drill. It is also the simplest to set up and get started upon. There needs to be 3 people for this, so gather your friends and lets get started. Give one player a ball, I recommend using a tennis ball at the start, especially for kids. The other 2 stand in a way to make a triangle and have these 2 to turn their back.

The player with the ball shouts "NOW!" and throw the ball at one of the players. As soon as the player shouts, the other 2 players turn and catch the ball. They won't know who the ball has been thrown to until they turn, so it tests both players' reflexes. You then rotate the players after a certain number of throws (let's say 10).

Fielders vs Batters

This is a neat concept, which surprisingly isn't taught on many schools, or cricketing academy. It is the simplest possible way of getting the players engaged and out of their comfort zone. In addition to all that, it trains the next fielders in passing and throwing and the next batters in running.

To set this one up, you will need a few fielders (4-7 is ideal) and a similar number of batters (4-7 is ideal). Set the fielders apart form each other in a zig-zag like pattern. Additionally, set the batters in the position to run from one wicket to the other, in a queue. Have a time set (4-7 minutes are ideal). The fielders see how many times can they catch the ball successfully in that given time and the batters try to see how many runs have they completed.

Attacking Front Foot Drives

This is a great drill for batters. It is also very, very easy, you will however need a net for this. You could do it in open air, but it's not recommended in open air, as the ball will just fly out. To set this one it is very simple, make a queue (3-6 recommended, no more than this per net) of batters and have a bowler (anyone).

The first batter gets in the spot and the bowler makes underarm throws, so the batter can then hit the ball. Each batter will have 3-5 consecutive balls, after this, the batter will go to the back of the queue. This is a great drill to do and master.

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Cricket Drills - Batting

Batting is an essential part of cricket. Everyone will have their opportunities to shine and score fours and sixes. All batters need to to able to hit the ball, not just a random hit, but hit it with sufficient power, so the ball can go out of bounds and the team can score more points. Batting can last for a long time, once you are there, you stay until you are out.

The following are some awesome drills you can do to practise. But my main form of batting drills would be to just play a game with your friends and try and improve it, but if that's impossible, then check out these awesome, incredibly simple, and super powerful drills to master the art of batting.

Drop Feed Drive

This is one of the simplest drills to increase your batting skill. It is a one-on-one drill with a batter and a feeder (can be anyone). The feeder drops the ball directly in front of the batsman. The feeder must be off the site of the batter, so the batter can bat the ball comfortably. The batter steps forward and his aim is to hit the ball on its second bounce and drive the ball through the ground and through the target area, which can simply be a pair of cones.

Bobble Feed

This is to be done in pairs and within a net, although you can preform it in any environment. The net is just so the ball doesn't escape the field and you don't need like an unlimited number of balls. To preform this drill, each net contains a batter and a feeder and there are target cones set up. The feeder bobble feeds the ball and aims towards the batter, who tries to steer the ball through the target cones.

As a coach, you should aim to make all of your players better in field. To do so, you should see and note down the progress of your batter. You can make the target area tighter so the batter can practise more on narrow spaces.

Cricket Rounders

Cricket rounders is a classic, preformed by everyone, from professional cricketers to junior school children. Cricket rounders are like a 'normal' match but have their differences as well. You set up 2 teams and assign one team's role as batters and other team as fielders. The fielder throws the ball and the batter has to hit the ball. 

There can be 3 outcomes of this, one, a fielder catches the ball before it hits the ground and the batter is out, so the next batter bats. The second outcome is that the ball hits the floor and the fielders pick it up and hit the batter with it before the batter reaches the safe area, if this happens then the batter is out as well. The last outcome is that the batter reaches the safe area before being caught by the ball, or have the ball being caught.

If the last one is the case, then the batter must return and go to the end of the batters queue. While the batter is returning it is possible for him to get eliminated by getting hit with the ball. If the batter is successful, then the batting team gets a point. The batter doesn't necessarily have to stay in the safe area and wait for the next batter to bat, he could just get into the safe area and out straight away, which yields 3 points. But the batter in the safe area cannot chose to stay and leave when a fielder is bowling. This is a penalty and the batter gets eliminated. There is also a limit in the safe area, which can be adjusted to your liking.

At  the end, record the points for the batting team and then switch the teams so that the previous batting team is now the fielding tea and vice-versa. In the end, the team that gets the most points wins. This is a fun activity and you can make many modifications with it, such as having a maximum of one batter in the safe area.

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Cricket Drills - Catching

Cricket is a very demanding sport, to cope with that added demand, you should start off at an early age. Cricket allows children and adults to stay fit, and it teaches the importance of team working. The easiest and most effective form of helping anyone become the next Sachin Tendulkar, is through training and drills at a regular schedule.

The drills we have put together are not just amazingly simple cricket drills, but they are so easy to do that even under 5 year olds can do them. In addition to being simple and easy, they also help you can improve your catching skills as a fielder in cricket.

Warm up Drill

Warm up is the most important drill in any kind of sport or exercise. It gets you in the mood for playing cricket and helps your muscles to get ready for throwing, batting and catching. This very simple warm up drill is made up of 2 teams (as many people in each as you want, the recommendation however is of 10 people, 5 in each team). 

You set up 2 squares with 4 cones and inside them, place the stumps. You can pass the ball along the ground, you can run with the ball, but passing must be underarm and along the ground. You are not allowed to make overhead passes at all. Your aim is to hit the stomps, but there is a catch, no one is allowed within the squares. Additionally the ball can never go out of bound, as there are not limits to the size of the ground. My recommendation if children are doing this would be to use a smaller area. Remember, this is a warm up drill, is doesn't and shouldn't be an intensive exercise.

Short Catching and Underarm Throwing

This is a very easy to do and supper effective. The main goal of fielding in cricket is to catch the ball before it goes out of bounds. This amazing drill gets your hands in the 'mood' of catching thrown balls, the best part, this is for all ages and genders.

To preform this drill, you use a cone to set up an area where the fielder stands, then use another cone and set up a queue of about 5 people. The fielder rolls the ball out, the first player in the queue picks it up and throws it over the cone, to the fielder. The first player goes to the back of the queue. This process is repeated until the last player, who goes to the fielding position rather than the player position.

To make this more challenging and fun, you can set up teams and challenges for players to achieve. For example you could set up so that the first team to have 20 throws and catches perfect, without any interruption (not catching the ball, ball hits the ground, etc.) wins.

Catching Drill

This very simple and effective drill tests the player's reactions and accuracy. This is the easiest to set up in this list and it only requires at least 2 players. 

To set this up, you place 2 cones at your chosen distance and have 2 players stand behind them. The cones must be at a straight line, opposite to each other. Give one of the players a ball and have them throw, so the other player catches. You could set this up so that the players are close together and they make underarm throws, or that they are far away and make more powerful, overarm throws. Or, even better, you could have them closer together t the start, then gradually move them further away from each other. 

This could also be converted into a competition to have all players engaged. To do this, you need more people, it could be your friends and family. Have them throw and catch, if a throw is misplaced and the player is unable to catch, they are out of the game. The last one surviving wins. An alternative to this is to have them throw as many throws as possible in a given time (such as 60 seconds). To make this a harder training set, you could have them close together when you start and gradually increase the distance between them. This is not just fun, but it trains your catching ability, because lets face it, sooner or later you need to be a fielder in the realms of cricketing.

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