Fitness in cricket is vital to improve performance. While playing and practicing are the most important part of the game, players looking to develop need to spend time in the gym too. This means that in part of your pre-season training should be dedicated to developing your pure sport strength. Before you begin on this programme here are a few key points:

1. You should never begin any exercise programme without knowing and understanding your health history. If you are in any doubt that you can safely perform exercise, contact your doctor before starting.
2. Some of these exercises are complex to perform and as you will be doing them a heavy weight you will need a training buddy of gym instructor to help you.
3. This is a short term pure strength plan designed as part of an overall preseason training schedule. You can see the full programme here. 
4. The goal is not to bulk up or increase muscle hypertrophy; it is to increase cricket strength. There is no need to worry about getting too big as you will not be training long enough or in the same way as a bodybuilder does.

The Pure Cricket Strength Workout 

• Remember to warm up and cool down.
• Always begin with a good general warm-up and at least one warm-up set at much lower weight.
• Control movements over 3-4 seconds each way with 1 second pause.
• The focus is on improving strength, so while form is vital you can comprimise slightly to work harder. Supervision for this is vital as the risk of injury is higher.
• The focus of this phase is strength so there is no running as running can slow your strength improvements. If you are concerned about weight control add a 10-12m HIIT workout to the end of your training days.

The see the full workout click here.