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As a cricketer one can have a lot of down-time. The moments actually spent executing a skill, whether it be diving for a ball in the outfield or cracking a shot through the off side, is something that can be measured in milliseconds.

Unless you are in the middle, you can be sitting on the balcony; making a cup of red bush tea (the so-called healthy non-caffeine type), or talking trivialities with a team-mate. In such periods, it is fascinating how the mind can wander, especially if one's form is poor. The extended period of time and energy not being expended out in the middle can lead to over-analysis and introspection, a tendency I developed too often in the early part of my career.

In what is becoming an ever more complex and technological age there is an increasing emphasis on analysis of players, opposition and the inner workings of one's own team. It's come to the point where I've begun to wonder what England's post-war players would have made of such an experience. Take my grandfather, Denis Compton, for instance. He was the David Beckham of his era, yet he often needed reminding what time a Test match actually started!

In his day, he and his team-mates would play golf on their days off to maintain fitness and nurture their competitive instincts. Today's regime involves bleep tests, measurement of skin folds, and computer analysis alongside technical practice sessions on specially-designed ball machines, for both fielding and batting. My grandfather is alleged on occasions to have missed the start of play, yet still made a hundred in someone else's kit and while using the No. 11's bat! What would he have made of life as a professional cricketer in the new millennium?

The modern professional arrives at first-class games on the eve of the match, participates in lengthy team meetings, highlighting opposition strengths and weaknesses with the use of computer-generated data to back up strategic points designed to enhance the team's education of the battle ahead.

And yet, has the modern player become too technically minded? My own journey has mirrored this, and in questioning the best way forward for me personally, I have gone through a period of exploring alternatives. Finding the mental courage to free oneself up, and play with joie de vivre when the match intensity is at its greatest, is a paradox for all players seeking new peaks in performance.

One aspect that I've found increasingly interesting, is the balance between technical intelligence (ie knowledge of one's batting style on a physical level) and emotional intelligence (ie the ability to manage one's emotions). That old cliché, that batting is 90% mental and 10% technical has been repeated in many an article on the psychology of the game, but how true is this statement, and just what is meant by "the mental game"?

Take Andrew Strauss's Man-of-the-Match innings recently at Old Trafford, which won the second Test for England against New Zealand. For me, that innings was more about mastery of emotion than perfect technique. Strauss is leaving more balls outside the off stump and not searching for runs like he was 12 months ago. But is that as much a technical advance as it is an emotional one? He appears to have a calmness about him which is in contrast to his demeanour at the crease in the previous 12 months.

As cricketers, we hit hundreds if not thousands of balls on the bowling machine while refining what we hope will be the perfect technique, and how often have I seen batsmen after getting bowled, (and I definitely include myself in this category) walking straight to Cricstat (the program where we can watch our innings ball by ball) to check if their shoulders were sideways on or whether their front foot landed in the right place.

The problem is that in preparation we all want to achieve something tangible, something we can both see and feel at the same time. But this, in my experience, can create changes which can be cosmetic. I’m beginning to understand that real change must come from within in order to achieve consistency of thought, which can then lead to consistency of behaviour. Practicing behaviour is less tangible. It requires a patience and dedication. It is not something that can be seen by the naked eye.

We've all watched Johnny Wilkinson go through his routine when he takes his place kicks. Those cupped hands, the view of the seam drawing a line through the centre of the posts, and a dead aim through the middle before he fires his leg up and allows the rest to happen. The truth is it's no different each time; he repeats his routine whether in a club game, a training session or a world cup final. This is what he does. I'm sure it would be quite easy for him or anyone else to place the ball down and think to hell with all that visualisation, making myself calm stuff - I'm just going to put the ball down and kick it. It can be easy to become complacent in one's routines but I suppose what I'm learning is that behavioural consistency takes a lot of patience, a lot of time and certainly a lot of practice.

I was fortunate to spend some time with the ex-South African opening batsmen and current India head coach Gary Kirsten last winter, in Cape Town. Gary was a player not particularly noted for his elegance or natural ability, but he was a top international batsmen and someone who prided himself on maximising his strengths and working with what he “was given” on any particular day. His biggest message to me was to rid myself of ego. It's far more important to be willing to accept and work with what one has on any day than to tell yourself: this is how I should be playing and how I want to play.

He told me to take expectation out of the equation and go with: “'Let's just see how I play today”. By spending more time with acceptance, I soon realised that in fact it's okay that things aren't going the way I would like. The irony is the more time you spend being displeased with your current performance the longer it's going to take for it to improve. So be accepting of how it is in the present, be kind to yourself and it won't be a surprise that as your ability to control your emotions increases, so will your performance.

I'll never forget one particular day. First he asked me: “Compo – how do you define playing well?”

I answered confidently: 'Timing the ball well, feeling at ease and dominating.”

His response astonished me. “Really? Well do you want to know what playing well is for me? It's about scoring runs irrelevant of how well or badly it comes off the bat.”

He described an occasion during South Africa’s tour of England in 2003, the series in which Graeme Smith scored consecutive double centuries.

During the fourth Test at Headingley, Andrew Flintoff was bowling very quick and Gary told me there were times when he was genuinely scared. He even admitted that he feared that if a single one of the short-ball barrage he faced that morning had been smack on target, it might have been the end of his career. After two-and-a-quarter hours in that first session he managed just 13 runs. "It was simply a matter of survival," he told me.

Kirsten, that day, didn't fight the fact that he couldn't score a run; he didn't tell himself: “I'm a good square cutter”, or, “'I know I'm good off my legs so if it's there for me I'm going to have a go”. Instead he looked deep into himself and said: “No I don't feel good today. I'm just going to stay with this as long as I can.”

As it happened he came out after lunch, hit one in the middle, and suddenly he felt in complete control. Gary stayed with his discomfort. He even became comfortable with feeling uncomfortable. He remained in the dark tunnel a long time, but through the dogged single-mindedness that was always his trademark, he emerged out the other end, with a brilliant 130 that rescued his side from 21 for 4, and won the match for South Africa.

His story is a great lesson in acceptance – for any cricketer to adapt and embrace the demands of any given day and always to make the most of what that day brings.

How often do you go out to bat and feel like a dog? How often do you fight it to the point where batting is no fun? These days I’m trying to steer away from judgement, because it's only your ego that judges you and builds unwarranted expectation. When I observe the leading players, I see that the honest players – the ones most true to themselves – are invariably the ones with the soundest work ethic. The ones with the soundest work ethic are invariably more consistent. They seem clear-minded; content; and appear to be at greater peace with themselves.

The key for me has been in understanding the important part emotion plays in performance. In doing so, I am re-discovering the “fun” element in the challenge between bat and ball after years of obsessively pursuing an unrealistic objective of “'the perfect technique”', and getting too caught up in the analysis of my game. The writing process has also been very helpful in clarifying some of my ideas about how best to develop, and a good use of time when not engaged in matchplay. Thank heavens for down-time!

Nick, this is a remarkable piece of writing on batting, and the bit about behavioral consistency feels spot on. When I started out playing college cricket in Bangalore, I remember reading someone's tour diary from the West Indies about dealing with their pace battery in the 1980's. My take home message from that book was the mantra "Determined batting ahead of flamboyant attack". Every time I took my stance to face a ball after that, regardless of my technical proficiency on the day (read 'ball-hitting form'), I found that if I had just this one thought in my head, I wasn't getting out. Facing each new ball required me to go over this thought as I began to take my stance. And the best part of the learning curve was, I could map my lean form in scoring runs to when I went away from this ball-by-ball routine. Your piece on behavioral consistency really came home to me. I hope your season flourishes this year, mate. All the very best!

How very true it is that removing the burden of expectation often leads to increased performance - and especially relevant to those of us for whom timing is more elusive than is the case for many professionals!! The other related point is simply to have faith in your ability that got you to a certain point. When Kirsten said to you that he just said he'd "stay with this as long as [he could]", it must have also taken an affirmation that it would all come right. To remove the burden of expectation without the thought of faith in your own ability is counterproductive. Also, expectation can change based on situations. Whilst generally expectation as a batsman is based on scoring runs freely and timing the ball, in some situations such as facing a hostile spell of fast bowling or trying to play for a draw at the end of a match, expectation shifts from free scoring to survival. This however does not mean that you remove expectations, merely that you shift them. Very well written, too, Nick.

a really really interesting piece of writing! i shall certainly be digging deep in the style of gary n taking on some of his ideas!!! keep writing great stuff nick good luck with the season

"He even became comfortable with feeling uncomfortable."

Mate, you are good. You have a career as a sports journalist.

I have no clue what a professional cricketer feels about his cricket but if I am to judge from the way you write, you guys are really really serious.

I am doing a Ph.D. in applied math. Honestly, it is 'work' and I would rather be out playing than sitting indoors. My question is

Is cricket 'work' to professional players? Or, is it still a game that you enjoy and have fun playing?

My suspicion is your grandad played it for fun. You (by you I mean professional players) play it as 'work'.

It's a pleasure to read a piece that has had some considerable thought put into it. It's fascinating for club cricketers like me to read the Kirsten theory. While it's impossible to replicate that kind of doggedness in a limited overs club game, it is certainly possible to take the lessons from the story.

Capitalism is my answer to you Vishvesh. I think you've hit the nail on the head, finding that balance between work and fun is tough especially in an increasingly pressured existence. Cricket is a job like any other but the challenge is to enjoy it. The more one can get the playful element back into ones game the more relaxed one can be etc. If you play well you enjoy it, if you don't you don't so much. I think the challenge is to enjoy the sport for all the reasons you did when we were kids at school. I suppose if you focus on that then the runs, money etc will follow...

Terrific piece, Nick - I trust you're sending them all to the broadsheets and badgering them for space, cos we need as much intelligence in cricket as we can get, to balance the shift towards obsession with celebrity and football-style hype that's inching its way into the game bit by bit.

More power to your (high) elbow!

Fantastic piece. Puts the typical writing by current and former players to shame. Valid points well argued with more than a touch of personal experience thrown in. Very good article.

Brilliant stuff. Although, regrettably, you are not the new Denis Compton, who gave me so much pleasure in my long distant youth, watching him at Lord's. I suspect you may have the touch of a new Neville Cardus and that is a quality that is eternal. Best o' luck in both your careers.

Hi Nick

I liked your article. I think you raise a good point about not making demands of oneself that are too sepcific and that are very hard to measure anyway.

However I would like to point out that most batsmen have a style they feel comfortable with and it is a style that allows them to dictate terms to the bowler. For some it is defence and an attitude that says ive got all day mate so you just keep bowling them and il keep blocking them let call it boycottism or kallisism. The other extreme is obviously far more flamboyant and says whatever you throw at me im going to take you on. Lets call is Slaterism or Laraism. These two were always looking to dominate by scoring rather simply than by being hard to get out.

So I would ask you which one is MORE like you and aim for that.

Be comfortable with yourself. Remember what qualities brought you to where you are now and refresh your game. Use technology to add not to analyse.
Listen to others and take the stuff you feel would help - Mike Brearley & Geoff Boycott will give a range of views to consider. Don't let the stats or the tecnology change you - rely on your ability and have strength to pick up , use or discard what you see and hear as you feel fit. Only you know what you want from all this.