How to combine cricket with your football Off-Season and Pre-Season

Just quickly - Cricket is just one example (it just happens to be the most common one). For many it is more basketball. For some it is track and field (and if so – fantastic, you are doing your strength and conditioning coaches job for them.)

This is a particularly pivotal discussion within the junior/high-school sphere, but this topic actually relates to anyone combining another sport that they take at least semi-seriously in the football off-season and pre-season.

First things first – good – doing something else – be that cricket, or tennis or rowing is fantastic and will provide ongoing physical development in patterns and loads that footy does not, and it will also do so in a manner that gives a break whilst still being physical. That goes for all adult players, not just juniors – but is particularly important the younger you are. If you are 13 or 14, do as many different things as you can, rather than Pidgeon-holing into 1 early (because you may just hit 16 and realise you have borderline national level (Olympic) volleyball ability (for example) whilst being at best a good-average footy player. Keep as many avenues open as you can, regardless of how much you love this one.

But as mentioned, for plenty of footballers, summer means cricket. That can create a bit of a programming dilemma. You want to enjoy and perform well in cricket, but at the same time, the football off-season and early pre-season are important periods for developing the physical qualities you will need when football returns.

The solution isn't to try to complete a full football pre-season on top of cricket. In many cases, cricket is already providing a reasonable amount of your weekly sporting load. Instead, look at what cricket is already giving you, identify what it isn't, and use your additional training to plug those gaps. For most adult and junior footballers playing cricket through summer, that can actually be relatively simple.

Naturally what you will build in comes down to how much you actually get out of cricket (matches) - as one day can look very different to the next.

Are you a batter predominantly, or a bowler – pace bowler? And then, how many overs did you bowl, how many balls did you face before being out? These can vary so much from week to week (meaning one week you may add in more around cricket than another). Importantly, still spending 7-10 hours in the field in the direct sun, whilst not looking like much on a GPS, is still physically taxing.

So without over-complicating it with dozens of different scenarios, make your decisions based around 2 key questions;

1.What your actual physical load and output is like in cricket (which granted can vary a lot from week to week) in terms of how much sprinting and running you are doing batting and bowling,

2.What needs the most work or is your main priority in your footy training. And think of this as do you need to focus more on being more speed dominant in your training? Or more conditioning dominant (what is commonly thought of as 'fitness') in your training? Full body strength development is needed for all – including cricket. So this element is simply a non-negotiable, and assumed.

1. Count cricket as training

Nice simple one to start – this does count toward footy training (more than not playing cricket). Training sessions, matches, bowling, fielding and running between wickets all contribute to your overall weekly workload. Depending on your role, you may already be completing multiple sporting sessions each week.

So don't simply add a standard four or five-day football off-season program on top. Start with your cricket schedule and build around it. The aim is to complement cricket, rather than compete with it.

2. Keep two full-body strength sessions each week

Strength is the main thing to make sure you continue to get in and add on top of cricket itself. So if you can only realistically add 60-90 minutes into your week – Make it 2 x 30-45 minute strength sessions. This will be beneficial to both cricket and footy as well. The meat and potatoes of the program will be very similar, with the sprinkles on top being more batter or bowler focused, or more footy focused depending on what your priority is.

For most footballers, two quality full-body strength sessions per week is enough to continue making meaningful progress without allowing gym work to dominate the week.

Across those sessions, cover the major movement patterns: squat and single-leg work, hip-dominant exercises, upper-body pushing and pulling, calf work and trunk strength. You don't need enormous sessions or endless exercises. Four to six well-selected movements performed consistently and progressively will generally achieve far more than trying to cram everything into each workout.

3. Ensure some genuine speed exposure

Cricket involves acceleration and short bursts of movement, but it doesn't necessarily expose you regularly to the type of sprinting required in football. Fast bowlers are probably the exception here. This is particularly important if you are a batter or wicketkeeper, where much of your running may be extremely short. Even fielders can go long periods without producing genuine high-speed running.

Free Explosive 20m Acceleration Program included here

This comes back to the point e touched on earlier - are you more speed focused or conditioning focused in your needs through the off-season? If it is speed focused, and you are seldom getting genuine top end acceleration and speed, this is the other area to look to try to squeeze into your schedule as a priority. 

One dedicated speed session each week can fill this gap (25-40 minutes including a thorough warm up and heaps of rest times is all it is). It doesn't need to become a conditioning session disguised as speed training. Keep the volume relatively low, allow plenty of recovery between efforts and focus on quality. Depending on where you are in the off-season, this could include acceleration work over 10–30 metres before gradually introducing some longer sprint exposures as football pre-season approaches.

4. Don't automatically add more running

One of the easiest mistakes to make is assuming that preparing for football means immediately accumulating kilometres. If you're already playing and training for cricket several times per week, adding large amounts of running can quickly turn a manageable training week into an unnecessarily high workload.

Early in the football off-season, I would often rather use off-legs conditioning to fill any aerobic conditioning gap. Additionally, if you are on legs a lot for cricket, and you are conditioning focused more so that speed focused in your footy off-season, the conditioning hit would best be kept off-legs. 

Bike, rower, swimming, assault bike my personal favourite or other low-impact (yet intense and effective) conditioning allows you to develop the energy system needs without continually adding more running stress to the legs.

5. Gradually shift the balance as football approaches

Your program shouldn't look identical in October and January. Earlier in the off-season, cricket can make up a larger proportion of your overall sporting workload while you concentrate on building strength and addressing physical weaknesses externally (largely gym focused).

As football gets closer, the balance should gradually change. Running exposure can increase (quality not quantity, but with the off-legs conditioning replaced with strides and structured tempo runs). Change-of-direction work can be introduced or progressed, with some exposure to kicking footys as part of your warm up too. 

This gradual transition is important (and generally speaking would occur at some stage in mid-to-late January for most). The goal isn't to suddenly finish cricket and begin football pre-season from scratch. You want to progressively bridge the gap between the two sports.

6. Keep the weekly structure simple

There isn't one perfect weekly schedule because cricket commitments vary enormously. But the basic starting framework can remain simple:

Cricket provides much of your sporting activity.

Then aim to plug the major physical gaps with:

2 × full-body strength sessions

plus

1 × dedicated speed session OR off-legs conditioning session

From there, adjust according to how much cricket you're actually doing and gradually increase football-specific running as the season gets closer. For some – this will involve footy pre-season itself.

The important point is that you don't need to choose between playing cricket and having a productive football off-season. You simply need to recognise what cricket is already providing — and deliberately train the qualities it isn't.