This is a guest posted drill from Laurie Ward of Complete Cricketer Academy.

This is the most terrifying batting drill you will ever experience. We call it "The Nazgul" because in Lord of the Rings, nothing is as scary as a Nazgul!

For the coach, it brings out the inner sadist. For the players, it's a way to work on hitting the ball into the right areas, even when you are exhausted and just want it to stop. It won't because there is no respite.

And also for that reason, we are careful about who we put through the pain. We do this with older junior and senior players with a of fitness and cricket, and some signs of mental strength. To help with motivation - which you will need - we have a league table and benchmark the levels.

So what is this awful experience?

The terrifyingly effective Nazgul drill

You can use a bowling machine for accuracy, but this will also work with throwdowns.

• The batsman faces 4 balls. We select a specific shot to work on, often the on-drive, as it ties in a lot of the elements we want to work on.
• Each shot is marked on footwork, shape/contact and outcome, each receiving 1 batting score point (max 3 points per shot).
• Click here to download the scoresheet as a pdf, or run a numbers sheet on your iPad.

After the 4th ball, the batsman does a set amount of exercise in full kit. This should be adjusted according to age/ability. This starts to fatigue the batsman.

Repeat for 20 balls.

You are halfway through it. Yep, halfway.

• Continue the drill but from now on, every 4th ball, the batsman has to complete as many of the same exercises in 30 seconds, in full kit.
• Keep track of these reps as they will become the player's "physical" score. To promote the running between wickets each run is worth 5 points.

You can then total the batting points and physical score.

After 40 balls, the ordeal is over.

A good batting score is around 100 out of 120, a good physical score for senior boys/seniors comes in around 200 and overall total around 290/300.

What do you find?

Now it's over to you. Try this drill out and come back here to share your results.

We have seen an amazingly consistent pattern emerge regarding focus/outcome through stages of fatigue. I would love to see if this pattern is consistent.

Please drop back by and give us feedback of how guys start, go through the middle phase and finish and see if this correlates with what we have seen.

Have fun (or be scared half to death, bwhahahaha)!