One of the biggest challenges I have faced this week is to cater for everyone's individual needs within a group of 20 children in Sardinia as part of a coaching camp.

We have a huge range of ages, abilities. Some players are trying cricket for a first time and others are already talented cricketers with aspirations of following my fellow coaches Paul Nixon and Dean Headley into International cricket.

Splitting players into groups

Each day we chose 3 groups of 6-8 and ensure that we change the motivation for the shifts from one group to another. The first day we did this around previous cricket experience (note we didn't mention ability), second day we grouped all the seam bowlers together, spinners and players who just wanted to focus on batting.

Today we are putting the most experienced players together in pairs with the little ones so they can learn from coping their peers and provide leadership opportunities for the more senior players.

Set up Games and Development Zones

We play a lot of games within our sessions. There is always a theme, for example yesterday we played a run out game for 2 teams with a relay throw between team-members before returning the ball to the keeper.

This was done for balls in the inner circle, following dives at point feeding the ball to the supporting fielder at cover who completes the run out. We also threw from the boundary to the inner ring, to the keeper for the run out.

We set up a throwing development zone off to the side of the game which allowed one of the coaches to pull players into the zone to work on a specific skill (stop/catch/throw) for a few minutes then reintroduced into the game with an enhanced and relevant skill.

Measure Success

We have 15 minutes every day where each player can earn points for performance. An example is a bowling skills test. Points are awarded for hitting a target on the pitch, points for hitting the stumps and a subjective score given by the coach for deviation of the pitch.

All the players were measured in 3 disciplines at the beginning of the week then again at the end of the week. We issue awards for people who improve most significantly (in %) in each discipline as well as an overall winner.

That way the awards don't always go to the best player but the players who have adapted and developed most over our 5 day course.

As with all clubs, awards are given to all players at the end of the week highlighting their individual and unique contribution to our time together. Some awards go to the best catch, the best celebration or the funniest moment.

Everyone goes away a better and more enthused player as a result.

Can any of the points here help you to manage and develop big groups of players in your clubs and schools?