You’re Not Unlucky | A Coach & Player Perspective

Briony, do you think we’re still losing too many players from the game despite all the investment that’s gone into it?

Yes, I do. There’s more opportunity than ever, but that doesn’t automatically mean that players are staying in the game.

Because on the surface, the game’s in really strong place. More pathways, more programs, more visibility.

Yeah, but underneath all that, there are still players quietly drifting away.

And it’s not always because of ability, it?

No, more often it’s about a lack of confidence or just not enjoying it anymore.

Yeah, well that’s exactly what we’re going to be exploring today with two fantastic guests.

I’m Briony Brock

and I’m Nathan Wood.

Welcome

to the Cricket Mind Podcast.

Now today’s episode is a bit of a first because we’ve not just got one guest on the pod, but two. And we’re going to be talking about something that sits right at the heart of the game. Not just performance, but participation as well. And we’re going to be exploring “Why do players stay in cricket?” and also “Why do they drop out too?” Now there’s been a huge amount of investment

and opportunity in the game, particularly in the women’s and girls pathway. But one of the biggest challenges that still exists is engagement and retention. So to explore that, we’ve got a really interesting dynamic on the show today, a coach and a player who have worked closely together. First, we’ve got Laura De Silva. Laura is a level three coach and a coach developer.

who has worked within the Middlesex pathway and now coaches within the set up at Suffolk. And what really stands out about Laura is the relationships she builds with her players and the impact that has on both their performance and their long-term engagement. And alongside Laura, we’ve got one of those players, Charlotte Bernstein. Charlotte represents Middlesex at under 16 level.

Thank you.

you

So my first question is to you, Charlotte, and that is what makes you actually want to keep on turning up to training and also playing the game of cricket?

I’d say my friends are a huge factor of that because I see a lot of people that I don’t go to school with and people that I wouldn’t normally be friends with that it’s like a really nice dynamic. Also on a Friday night after club training, we all have dinner together and it’s just a really nice atmosphere at the club and it’s really fun. I’d also say the competitiveness of the sport really, because it keeps me excited. It keeps me wanting to come back.

⁓ And finally, I think the training is also really important for me because it means I can work on my game and it makes me keep improving, which means I enjoy the games more as well. Nice. And do you have, you talk about Friday nights there, which I imagine is probably with your club. Yeah. Have you ever had experiences at training sessions or things you’ve been involved in where maybe

the experience wasn’t quite as positive and there were reasons that actually you didn’t want to keep turning up and you felt like maybe it wasn’t for you? Definitely not with any of the girls stuff. I’ve always really, really enjoyed my county and club stuff. Potentially with some of the boys stuff, from a younger age I used to play boys’ cricket, which it was quite hard being the only girl to keep coming back when they’re stronger than you. But all the boys have really, really matured and…

I’m really enjoying boys cricket now. So yeah, that was only really in the past.

Charlotte, you mentioned friends have a big impact on, you you carry on playing the game. Are those friends, are they cricketers themselves? Are they in the game of cricket?

Yeah.

So do you have friends outside of cricket who also influence how you feel about the game?

Yeah, well most of my friends at school don’t really understand cricket as much so it’s harder for them like when I’m like, they’re revising because I’m in my GCSEs and I’m like, I’m at cricket today the whole day. They don’t really understand that. So it’s really nice like separating my school life from my cricket life and yeah, that’s really nice.

The reason why I ask is because when I was at school, which was a very long time ago, ⁓ a lot of my friends didn’t have any idea about cricket and they used to say it was boring and all those kinds of stuff. And I think I was influenced by that a bit actually. And I became quite conscious about it. So I was just kind of curious as to your experience of those friends who don’t know much about the game.

Yeah, luckily my two closest friends have had some experience with cricket. They don’t play anymore, but they were questioning yesterday why I was standing for 50 overs in the field, not revising. They were questioning that, but yeah.

You

And a question for you, Laura. What is it that you do as a coach which actually keeps players coming back for more, would you say?

I think it’s a difficult balance. It’s not a difficult balance, but you have to get the balance between.

it being fun, but also being challenging. Because if it was just, it was just fun, you know, you can sort of pick anything just to do fun. You could just go and get an ice cream every Friday night instead of going and training. I think that the girls want to develop their skills and you know, cricket can teach you about life. If you want to achieve something in cricket and you work hard and you get to a point that you’re actually succeeding in it, that’s just a great template for everything in life. If you want to achieve something, you’re prepared to put the work in.

and get there and really the measure of success.

for every player is only.

you know, based on their own internal idea of success and their own standards. And that’s basically what any success is. It doesn’t have to be that To get 100. Who just wants to, you know, make sure that she can score 10 or 20 or bowl three overs with minimal wides. Well, that’s their own, you know, our own level of success and her standard. Then that’s what it is my job to make sure that she can do.

every player is capable of going into a county game scoring 100. If you’ve got a player…

Go.

So I think it’s kind of taking seriously every individual and what they want to get out of it. And, you know, somebody like Charlotte, she wants to be stretched to be able to play at a higher level, then it’s my job to help her get there. But if it’s just somebody wants to bowl straight with a straight arm and work out a run up, well, then that’s absolutely my job as well.

be stretched out high.

And that ⁓ kind of conscious intention to create the balance of stretching and fun and knowing the players individually, is that something that just kind of is core to you? Or was there a turning point when you were like, actually, this is really important for girls cricket in particular. I need to be, this is what the kind of coach I want to be, the kind of environments I want to create.

I’m not sure that it was a conscious decision. think my personal philosophy in pretty much everything is that ⁓ women and girls need to be taken more seriously. So I think it was probably an unconscious thing. just, that’s my, I don’t know, that’s the flow of how I do things. And I think that a lot of girls in cricket are not taken seriously. And that’s probably something that stands out.

the.

⁓

Certainly in our club and from that perspective, you know, the girls train on their own. They have the whole place to themselves. And I mean, now obviously at our club now, there are only girls you know, it’s not, they don’t have to share, but yeah, I’m not sure that I made a conscious decision to do that, but I think that, I think that’s just my sort of approach to everything.

Well, and you go so.

them.

Thanks.

So Laura, you said, I’m going to butcher this now, but you said something about you take seriously every individual regardless of their ability or their kind of aims and objectives. How do you adapt your approach for different personalities? Because in that set up, those personalities will be very varied, whereas in a professional set up,

actually there’s a bit of difference in personality but they tend to be all focused and driven. How do you adapt your approach for those different types of personalities?

I think being able to pick up on different personalities is a skill that coaches should be aware of and work more towards because I think a lot of coaching you’ll see they go in and assume that they can just be the same with every player. And obviously there is a kind of understanding and this is what we work a lot on in coach development that, you

is all that coaches should.

you need to tailor what you coach for the player.

But the thinking about the player is not just what level they’re at or, you know, what it is they’re working on, but it’s also how they understand things, their learning patterns, how their brains work, how they, you know,

sort of work through both

what disappointments

and successes. And I think the sort of more that you can take in about each person, I really, I love thinking about patterns in people and how people’s brains work. And the greater understanding I can have of that will influence how I coach. So somebody likes a lot of feedback and thrives on a lot of feedback. I’ll make sure that’s delivered but sometimes it will be, there’s a reading that actually

So, feedback.

delivered, but

already

do you know you sort of get a lot of players who could be over critical of every single thing they do and actually that’s where it’s kind of like this is more than any sound with praise rather than the sort of constant commenting or or critiquing because it doesn’t you end up at point where some players sort of because they’re so

All I’ll do is fill, praise Rob.

critical of

their

own game, obviously from a point of wanting to improve, but it does become that thing where it’s almost like nothing is ever good enough. And actually, if it’s outcomes based, just sort of saying, well, that worked, it was good, is what that person needs. But that is completely dependent on how that person improves and works and also how they speak to themselves, because you’re just one voice coming into a player and that player is going to have their own voice in their head, along with every other coach, probably their parents, probably their peers.

So it’s like, what is my voice adding? Is it adding anything? Where do I come in all the voices in their head? ⁓ So that, you know, that’s something to think about. And actually I, it’s really interesting to talk about this when you ask the question like that, because until you speak about it, I probably don’t realize that that’s what I’m thinking or doing, but actually that is what I’m taking into account because a lot of the girls I coach will have another coach and will have other influences in their cricket. So where does my voice come in there as well?

a lot of

You mentioned improvement and it’s important for people to feel like they’re improving. I’ve recently got involved in my local cricket club and there’s a women’s section and I’ve been coaching them and I’ve never coached a women’s team before. And the women’s team, the squad, it’s a massive squad, it’s bigger than the men’s actually. We’ve got more women training than the men’s team. And some of them have been playing for a few years and some have just started

and some want to take the game really seriously and others are playing for social kind of reasons. Do you think that it’s important for those women players, those female players who are purely just coming down to the club on a Monday evening for social reasons and to get away from the house for a couple of hours, do you think it’s important for them to improve their skills as well?

I think that depends on if they want to or not. If they are purely going down because it’s a bit of fresh air and getting out of the house, if that’s what they want then that’s what they’ll get. I think. I couldn’t answer that for the players at Monday night training at your women’s section but ⁓ I think I would

like you say.

they go go. ⁓

I would be surprised if they didn’t want to get better, but obviously the idea of improvement is individual for each person. So somebody might just want to get fitter rather than better at cricket, in which case they probably will because any additional exercise is going to make them fitter. But then you’ll have some people who like really get into it, even if they start as a beginner and their idea of improvement will be, well, I want to stop the ball in the field with my hands, cleanly, not with my foot or…

or fumble it or whatever it is. Like it could just be something really simple like that. Like I want to just look a bit more crickety or I want to be able to pick up the bat and feel like I look like I’m playing cricket rather than just sort of standing going, I think it could take any range and up to the top we’re gonna be, I want to score a hundred or I want to be able to lead this team. I want to help other people. That might be somebody else’s motive as well.

is, you

So a question for both of you and Charlotte I’ll come to you first. What does a really strong coach-player relationship look like for you?

Yeah, well, the answer would be different for everyone. But for me, a really supportive coach is ⁓ really important. I also think someone that’s really honest as well. Like I’m someone that I just want to keep improving and I don’t want to have a net and me be playing terribly. And they’re like, that’s really good because I want to keep getting better. also, Laura mentioned this before, but striking the balance between it being really fun and it also being competitive because

We had a group of 11 who played last Monday and we all want to win and we’re all at different levels. And it’s making sure people come back because we’re winning, because it’s in a fun way, I think. And for you, that, you said honest. So how, how much do you seek kind of feedback, kind of from them versus want to explore it more collaboratively?

Well, I’m someone that I always ask. I had a net with Laura on Friday and I always ask like for their feedback. And actually I also had a net with Johan who also, who’s Laura’s husband, who also says, no, like sometimes you’ve got to figure out for yourself because cricket’s such an individual sport. Like when you’re batting, you’ve got the other player, but they’re focusing on themselves. So you’ve got to be independent enough to, you know, understand it for yourself, but the coach needs to help you with that.

that make sense? Yeah, and I guess, as I kind of said with the coaching from Laura’s perspective, have you had any experiences where you felt like the relationship with the coach has not been so good and that’s really highlighted to you how important it is to have a good one? I don’t think so. Like all the coaches at Middlesex I really get on with and they’re all really like individual to each player.

which I think is also a really important aspect of a coach because as you’ve mentioned before, like everyone’s so different in the way that they want to approach cricket.

And Laura, from your perspective, what does a strong coach-player relationship look like?

I I like Charlotte’s use of the word honest. And I think that ties into what I would say is just trust and trust works both ways. If I think about, think rather than a club session, if I was coaching a county session, you know, I trust that they’re going to turn up and work and they trust that I’m not going to push them too hard or that I’m going to make it too easy. You know, and there’s also

So what I would say that it’s, you know.

hard.

on

plays into way through. not just, not just for cricket, but they trust that if they turn up and say, I’m feeling tired, I’m not going to be like, well, tough, get on with it. And equally.

Bye.

You know.

it well I just just think that that’s the all-encompassing answer is trust and it is both ways ⁓ you know I know that they’re going go out and try their hardest and they know that if they don’t manage it I’m not going to be like why you so rubbish because I never think that actually so yeah

that they

It probably sounds like I’m being the kind of negative one here, but I’m going to go there anyway. Have you ever struggled to build a strong relationship with a player? What kind of barriers do you ever see when it maybe is a bit trickier?

Honestly, you obviously have personality clashes with some people. So I think I find it harder to create that sort of relationship when they are not particularly interested or don’t resonate with what I expect from them. So like in a county, probably more so in a county team, if they sort of turn up not prepared to work hard or treat it as a bit of a joke or just a bit like, meh you know, they’re not giving me a huge amount. So I find it very difficult to

I

to create.

to work hard.

form that relationship with them, that’s what I would say. But I think that’s probably, you know, that’s going to be the case just in two human beings meeting each other. But, you know, then my challenge is that it’s not always going to be that everybody’s super keen and really easy to coach. So I have to figure out how I can change my approach and get out of that player that I don’t find easy, what they can because that’s my job.

Big Chugga.

actually get.

I think that’s probably the only thing that is challenging is when you get people who are a little bit, you know, I’m then at club level reluctant. don’t know, dad wants me to play. I’m not that interested. I’ve got to change it so that there is something for you there, even if you’re not massively keen on cricket, but you know, that might be the one which is like, well, okay, yes, roll down the hill and play with the spiders and then come back and throw a ball and good enough. At least you’ve thrown a ball, you’re working on a bit of fitness and you’re in the fresh air. Well, fine. So that’s that is.

well.

Bye.

you’ve got something out of it

And you’ve coached boys as well, Laura, obviously as well, as girls and women. Do you think that there are, do you find it as easy to establish those coach-player relationships? Do you see what are kind of the major differences you see or differences to your approach when you’re coaching boys versus girls?

Hmm.

I think it’s the same approach What I get back from boys is very different from girls.

approach.

I think girls respond to me well, particularly, obviously, because I’m a woman. I understand girls easily. Not to say that I don’t understand boys and I don’t create that relationship, but I think boys look at me and they’re confused. Whereas girls look at me and see a woman who’s doing the thing that they’re And I mean, you can imagine the scenario.

But I…

better to do.

with boys — I spend quite a lot of time asking them,

time asking

them, or encouraging them to be nice to one another, which I don’t have to do with girls. And saying things like, well, when you have an umpiring qualification, do come back and ask me that question again about me giving you out there. So that’s another one. Basically dealing with a lot of sort of questioning of my professional opinion, which I don’t ever get from girls.

and

Yeah. So it’s different in that way, but I think the same, I think I would probably have the same approach. don’t think it’s a bit different. I haven’t coached boys like a squad of boys for a long time. So obviously I’m thinking about teams that you’ll have for a whole season, you know, winter’s training season in summer. then, know, Charlotte’s case

voice or a group of voice.

years of of

coaching her and her squads and things like that. But yeah, I still, I would still encourage the same things from boys as from girls. Just sometimes it’s harder to get certain things out of boys like being nice to one another.

And do you think as well, where Charlotte, what you said that what kind of keeps you to training and matches is your friends, the fun, the competitiveness, those things. Do you think between the two of you, I guess, do you think those factors are sort of as salient for boys or do think there’s different drivers behind participation and attendance and so on? Well, from my experience with boys cricket, boys just want to win and they don’t really care if their friend’s off the pitch, it’s not necessarily on the pitch too.

And I think the difference with girls and boys’ cricket is that girls are very caring towards each other, like, you know, drop a catch, like, don’t worry, next one. Whereas boys are a bit more, like, ruthless. I don’t know if that’s the right word. ⁓ But yeah, I say that’s the only difference. But I’ve also, I also enjoy playing in a boys’ environment because I think it really pushes me because it’s more, as I said, ruthless than girls. So it kind of makes girls a bit easier.

Charlotte, I’m going to put you on the spot now. What has Laura done that’s made the biggest difference for you?

⁓ I think what Laura’s done is just create such an incredible atmosphere at a girls club, which I was at a girls club before and just didn’t experience the same thing. So I was like so confused when I came to the club. was like, what? This is possible? Like I think, yeah. And everyone would say that that was Laura and Johan who did that.

That must be quite nice to hear Laura.

Thanks.

Lovely.

So Laura, I think the single best thing that a coach can help a player with is to build their confidence up. As a coach, how do you go about building real confidence in your players? Because it’s different, isn’t it? It’s not just about pumping up the tires. How do you build, you know, I call it resilient confidence, confidence that holds up when you need it to. How do you go about that?

I think that it’s kind of like, it’s, you know, it’s like the use of the word resilient there is exactly, is exactly what you’re trying to do. And we do a lot of coaching on technique and a lot of skills coaching, but actually there is such a place for training people’s minds and brains in how to, ⁓ and how to deal with winning as well as how to deal with losing.

to deal with pressure.

And I think, sort of, if you compare it to like, if you have a small child and you give them things to achieve, you’re building up that, that sort of belief in themself that they can do it rather than just always doing it for them. You know, it’s a, I think it’s a similar, similar sort of unconscious strategy is just to make sure that the players

achieve.

So… So…

players

have

mental tools to deal with both success and failure you know I never ever

to deal with both successes and failure. So first of all, we would never ever coach through

fear. So if there is failure,

then there’s no negative,

you know, comeback from the coach. it would never be like why

Why

did you do that? Why did you drop that cat? Why did you play that stupid shot? Why you sweeping a straight one? Whatever. Like

leaving a straight one.

I just wouldn’t ever respond like that. And that, you know, they, know that that’s not going to happen, but it’s more sort of teaching them how to deal with it themselves internally. you know, how, how do you process that failure? Are you going to chow over it all evening? Are you going to go over it and figure out what you did wrong? Is it an approach rather than a skill? what can we do to work together to make sure that that doesn’t happen again?

Right.

which skill, what do.

So if

it was a case of poor shot selection

So that’s what we’re going to work on. We’re going to improve our strategies and our tools when we’re batting so that that doesn’t happen again or if it’s working with a captain who perhaps has seen.

improve our

or, you know.

their team lose a

an important game or something like that. How do you work with them to make sure that the pressure of being like a leader in that environment can be dealt with by them? And the thing is that it’s not, you know, I can’t do, the coach can’t do it for the players. It’s about thinking what we can do to help them prepare for those moments when there is failure. you know, that’s a golden question. How do you deal with things when they’re going wrong?

So how do you deal

Basically, you know, I think sometimes people mistake sort of positivity and a holistic quality thing, meaning that there’s not high technical skills, but I think that the combination of both of those, so making sure that

the

their technical ability is trained to a high standard, but also that more

that’s all

like holistic qualities

know, combined, can result in, you know, greater resilience for that. And also that they know that there’s going to be some kind of

and what’s the word, process to improve.

but like some kind of.

rather than it just being like, well, I’m rubbish and I’m going to be rubbish forever. I’m, you know, obviously you’re not, some people, they do come out feeling like that. And that’s the, reaction is obviously the worst just after it’s happened. then later on, you’re probably

Let me bother Shweta.

all well I’m probably not that rubbish actually

And Charlotte, that, I mean, you’re probably not going to say no here, but is that your experience of the environments that Laura creates as well? That sort of, there’s no real failure. Everything’s just kind of part of a bigger process of your development? Yeah, a hundred percent. Like even if I had a bad training session, whatever, bad match, like it’s a learning curve. It’s like an improvement rather than, you know, this is the end of my cricket career now. Like that kind of thing. Yeah. And you feel…

that you’re kind of supported to take risks and step up and that sort of thing as well? Yeah, definitely. Like it’s pushed. I’ve never like, I don’t lack confidence, but I lack, I don’t know, like I’ll never be like, no, I should definitely open the batting today. know, and they, Johan and Laura, like both of them, because they both do coaching for the girls have really pushed me in to be able to do that and be able to, you know, believe in myself more that I am good enough. I can do that. And all the girls would say the same thing, like no doubt. So.

Laura, you mentioned, ⁓ you said that you teach them how to deal with disappointment. How important is timing with this? So let’s say a player has a bad game. When do you start helping them with that support?

That’s a good question. I don’t know. think the first thing I would do is brushing it off doesn’t help. Making excuses doesn’t help. And I really like in some of my county squads I banned the word unlucky. Yeah. Not unlucky. You made a mistake. Making a mistake is absolutely fine. That is allowed. It’s not unlucky. It’s a mistake. Mistakes are fine. So that’s the first thing I would say.

“Unlucky” ⁓ It was only unlucky. Do know, there’s very few. Charlotte, you got out. Non-striker’s end. So unlucky. is an alright use of that word. That was very unlucky. Usually it’s not unlucky. Anyway, yeah, there’ll be an initial conversation, probably something a little soothing to sort of balm over the initial

I can’t bear it

It was a very nutty

That was very unlucky.

you know

feeling of disappointment. And then it would be a case of probably their next training session. If it was something that I felt, you know, if they were really, really hanging onto it, I might have a conversation with them like parents or something, you know, a day afterwards. And then it would just be into the next training session. Look, what are we going to learn from what happened in the last game? That’s not going to work on it. If, if it’s the case that the player, I don’t know, like if it was Charlotte had a bad game and she’s like, I need to have a net when they do this. Then obviously that’s her asking and.

Really.

Do

up whenever she wanted it to happen. I think sort of ongoing.

how we do it. but.

I do love that. ⁓ you need to ban the word unlucky. I mean, as a player, I absolutely hated it when I’d walk off a pitch and I knew that I played a horrendous shot again and somebody said, bad luck. I hated it as a player. And on Saturday I was watching the, the local team play and there were some pretty bad shots and the amount of people who go “bad luck” know, I was was it really? Are you learning from that?

Maybe just not say anything.

A fly flew into my face, I sneezed, you know, that’s bad luck. But making a poor decision is not bad luck.

Thank you.

Absolutely.

So, ⁓ Charlotte, you’re in the middlesex kind of pathway and as you go higher up that pathway, expectations can increase, can’t they? Both from within yourself and also from the outside. Other players, maybe parents, coaches, I don’t know. How do you manage that feeling of pressure without it affecting

your performance or your enjoyment?

I’m actually a bit strange. I really like the pressure. I think it makes me concentrate more. I think it brings out the best in me. But the reason why I think that happens is because I always say to myself, I need to do what I can control. And because you can’t control, I don’t know, someone bowls this amazing out swinging ball and hits the top of off stump, whatever. You can’t control that. But you can control getting to the game 45 minutes early. You can warm up.

you know, do your throw downs, warm up your bowling. And I’ve always kind of lived by that with my cricket and making sure that I don’t get to the game and have regrets. So I should have warmed up my bowling more.

That’s a great answer. Pressure makes you play better. I think a lot of it is about focus, actually. What helps you focus on the task. Different players have different emotive states to help them with that focus. I used to focus best when I was angry, believe it or not. But when you’re feeling pressure and that helps you focus on what you have to do, think that’s a pretty good skill to have.

And you Laura, guess in a sort of similar boat from a coach perspective, you coach a very successful team, you know, particularly your club side have been very successful ⁓ within the county. How have you managed that as those expectations have increased and sort of maybe other opposition approach your team and you a bit differently because of that kind of

I don’t know, status, I guess, or dominance. How have you kind of managed that?

think in the conversation with players, has to be, you know, we do talk about that, like teams turn up and they want to beat us because of what are and it’s actually just

who we are. It’s

like you, you the players, you the squad.

players,

especially if it’s like a team who have historically won things, it’s like you’ve got to to be able up your game when the pressure is higher because the pressure is, you know, if it’s higher because it’s not just above like a bog standard game it’s it’s a team turn up that often really want to beat you, How are you going to react to that. Being medium, which is usually good enough, might not be good enough this time. You’re going to actually have to

to be able to.

you.

really work hard for it. But that’s really good because

Cause

that’s just a different challenge. Cause if they’re to winning, you know, if, if sport would be boring, if the best team on paper won every time, you know, it’s kind of like, well, how are you going to deal with that pressure that’s brought by an opposition wanting really, like really, really wanting to beat you, not just because it’s a win, but because we want to beat you It’s difficult. You’ve got to, they’ve got to prepare mentally for it and keep really tidy. But I think the thing that I really urge from them is that

So.

that’s broke.

or what because we don’t like you because you win. Yeah.

They go in as a team, if they go in as a bunch of individuals, it’s just, they’re never as strong and looking around, making them look at each other and say, this is, this is your team, this is your vehicle for winning. This is your armour. Go together. You know, it’s just so important that they look around and realize that, that they do it together. One person’s not going to win a game on their own. They have to all go in.

This is your

⁓

And that goes from like Charlotte’s saying, being prepared at the beginning, turning off on time, making sure they’re focused, not thinking about their homework or what they had for dinner or whatever. It’s like actually bringing their minds into the moment and going right.

locking in now. We’re going to do it together.

What about you as a coach? Do you experience pressure on you to maintain success or to win those games or anything like that?

I don’t feel the pressure from myself as in people looking at me and thinking, oh, bad coach or good coach. It’s not so much that. think the challenge I find is that people can be rude and speak unpleasantly and that does happen and has happened the whole of my coaching experience. So sort of personally, that’s the thing that I find challenging.

of my-

And, you know, I come up with different ways of dealing with that. you know, how do you deal with anybody that’s been rude?

Ignore it, be rude back

Yeah, it can be hard, but I don’t, I’m not sure that I would ever think about myself because…

the success is do with me.

success is not to do with me really, it’s

not really at the end of the day.

So as a coach then in your head, if we’re not measuring success solely on winning, what other kind of metrics and things do you use in your head when your team playing a game that you think, yeah, that’s been a successful game?

If they do it together, if I feel like they look like a team and worked really hard as a team, never ever mind losing. And it isn’t about the winning. If I think they worked their hardest to get there. If I think they went in bit meh, know, bit minzy, then I’m like, I’m a bit, I’m a bit annoyed because I don’t think you gave your best performance. long as, as long as it’s, as long as I think they’ve given their best, then I’m happy because that’s what they owe themselves. It’s not really.

You know, again, I’m only experiencing that disappointment because I think you haven’t done yourselves proud there. doesn’t really matter what I think. You’ve got to play to make yourself proud. So if they’ve gone out and done their best, the result is irrelevent you know, from a, from a sort of style and technique point of view, obviously there are things I like to see like I think ⁓ girls feel, you know, I would, what was it I used say to Charlotte, about fielding, like it, cricket is a dynamic sport.

is a

What was-

Like make it look sporty, make it look sporty, especially girls cricket. Let’s make it look sporty, sporty in the field Running hard, throwing the ball hard, doing things with loads of energy. So that’s something like personally, I really liked to see if they’ve managed to do that, like fielding hard and really well. just, yeah, just. And figuring out how to be on top when they’re under pressure as well. If somebody’s, you know, you do the opposition.

like like

batting well or whatever, has everybody gone quiet or who’s remembered to carry on making it an atmosphere and be noisy?

Great success.

Charlotte, ⁓ how do you balance that commitment ⁓ to your cricket during really busy times like exams? I guess, are you having GCSEs at the moment? Yeah. How do you approach that? Because that is a tricky time, isn’t it?

Yeah, it’s also quite tricky because I do a lot of gym stuff because I injured my back as well. So today I’m fitting in. I’ve already played cricket and work and now I’m going to the gym later. But what works for me really well is having a timetable. Like I can’t do anything without a timetable. Like I need to know what time I need to wake up, what time I’m allowed to have lunch, what time. And that’s what really works for me. Also, I think I’m lucky in the way that

I can have cricket, can have gym to release my energy from revision because revising for eight hours on end is not beneficial for me. I don’t know if anyone else, but I get so bored. So I actually think I’m lucky to be able to go play cricket, see my friends, do all of that. I think that’s, yeah, it’s almost beneficial in a way.

So organization is pretty important in your world. yeah, fantastic. Charlotte, have you ever had a moment where you thought about quitting the game?

I don’t think necessarily quitting, but I struggled as I just said, like with, I had, I haven’t played the whole of the winter because I had a bad back and I’ve just been doing rehab for that. But I think that actually made, did the opposite of making me want to quit because I just wanted to come back even more. And I thought the first game I thought I was going to be really nervous because everyone else has had four more, five more months than me to practice. And.

I want to, as I said before, I want to prepare. So I thought I’d be nervous, but I just got back and I kind of felt like I’d never left from the last game, which was really, really nice.

Hmm.

And what about you, Laura? Have you ever thought about quitting as a coach?

No.

No, love it. I’m completely honored to be in their company and I would never do anything else. I’ve given up everything else around it. So now it’s just doing that.

See you just later.

Do you say it’s the players’ relationships that really keep you coaching and keep you motivated?

Yeah.

100%. And, know, I, when it’s not just coaching, so if I’m doing other things like, I don’t know, coach development or organizing, don’t know, specifically stuff to do with women for women and girls cricket, I just, you know, if you can teach another, another teacher, to put the, like the stress and importance on those relationships as well. Well, then, then it’s like, it expands, you know, it spreads further and further. So

to

It’s just, yeah, that’s the best bit.

So you were very clear there, Laura, “I’ve never thought of quitting”. Have you, what about players that you’ve coached? Have you had a couple of players who have thought about quitting and you’ve done something to kind of change their mind? Have you had that experience?

Yes, that’s a hard one and I think that really depends on what it is that they’re… ⁓

you know.

not feeling comfortable with. For some it’s taking the sort of pressure down. So if they’re playing games that are too competitive, then it’s about putting them back in at a sort of more gentle level. Making sure that they do it in their own time is such an important thing, not rushing it.

shut.

and

That’s usually what happens because it’s the pressure that has put somebody off. I think that’s probably the most common reason for giving up.

Do think that pressure is internal that they place on themselves or do think it’s something that comes from parents, coaches, friends, something else around them?

Thanks.

I think it comes internally. Obviously there is going to be bit of external pressure, but I think for most of the examples of people, think that I’ve coached, it will be dealing with it internally. And actually, you know, it might be that the pressure has sort of outweighed the enjoyment in which case I do totally understand that. And I think the thing that I often, like the phrase I often say to players is it’s really hard work being good at something because of the amount of pressure. And I think that’s the same for

being talented in anything, it’s really hard because the other thing is when you’re good at something, people just think, well life’s so easy for you because you’re so good at it. And you think, but actually the pressure is so much higher simply because people expect you to do really well. Like it’s really hard being the best player in a team because everyone goes, they’re so good. And then also that sort of goes hand in hand, but I think people don’t realize that they need the same amount of praise and the same amount of sort of looking after their minds and

Good.

that knocked it there.

you know, internally how they feel. Whereas, you know, people go, but we don’t need to tell them they’re because they know already. And you’re like, of course you do, because they still need to receive the same positive feedback. Just because they did doesn’t mean they’re sitting there thinking, I’m amazing. So no one has to tell me because I know. And I think that’s something especially girls really suffer from is that there’s that kind of, we don’t need to tell them they’re good because they know. Well, yes, you do because

like good skulls.

you

Just because they might be the best player in their team doesn’t mean they deserve positive feedback any less than somebody else. But yeah, I would say, Pressure is usually what puts people off, then it’s just kind of making sure if they do want to carry on playing, you can manage the expectation of them. So it might just be, don’t play on this team or don’t play up an age group or stop playing for county. But don’t play any matches, come to training and just see how you feel. And if we’ve got friendlies or like.

them.

usually is what puts people

the

Maybe it’s taking a step back and going to softball rather than hardball, something like that. You know, it’s just about how you can make them feel comfortable again.

with the sport.

Okay, final couple of questions to both of you actually. So what’s the one thing that coaches, parents or players should stop doing?

I’d say it’s a difficult question because everyone’s, everyone’s so different. And like, as you’ve said, like take it seriously, not seriously, but I think possibly like, I think for coaches, parents, just like not to get frustrated at all. And I’ve never actually experienced that, but just from like other people who have, and instead just, you know, be really positive, supportive. ⁓ cause I think there’s no, there’s literally no.

good that comes from getting frustrated because it just causes people to quit that kind of thing. And just helping them rather than getting frustrated is way more beneficial, I think.

and

Yeah,

100%. I would say the thing I think most frequently is stop making it about you. It’s the thing that I think about parents and coaches — stop making it about you.

which is. ⁓

Okay and what’s one thing that you start doing straight away?

that’s a good question. I think on my last point, just being supportive, just from the start, just, you know, you’re coming into a softball team, for example, just yesterday, my example is all the cricket mums played in a softball match ⁓ and they need support, like they need to…

and my mum was leading it and she just said, you know, they needed support because it was a really fun day, but they needed to know that they were doing well to be able to keep going. So I think that’s important.

Yeah, definitely support. ⁓

find alternatives with the word unlucky.

Ha ha.

It’s banned isn’t it? It’s banned in all cricket now. We’ve decreed it.

Can I ask a bonus question, Nathan? So Laura, you’ve been in Pathways and involved with Suffolk Women now and a coach developer. Why do you think there are not more women coaching women’s professional sides?

She can it

⁓ There aren’t enough female coaches. There aren’t enough female coaching opportunities. There aren’t enough opportunities for women to get involved. think quite a lot of women and girls cricket is still very much gate kept by men. And I think that this is the biggest change that can be made for all women and girls cricket is getting more female coaches.

Big

like.

That is just so important from a role model perspective.

Yeah.

And we’ve seen that, think it was FIFA, have announced that women’s teams have to be coached by women now in football. Would you like to see something similar in cricket?

Yeah, think that I think it’s hard, isn’t it? Because I know a lot of excellent male coaches of women. I also know lot of terrible male coaches of women. ⁓ And so it’s not, you know, it’s really hard because you don’t want to start getting into it when you can’t be a man and coach women because I absolutely do not think that.

I think the people who are in charge of these organizations need to realize that it’s their responsibility to make way and support women getting into those roles because

Yeah.

It’s hard as well, you you have a team of people, lots of them have been there for a while. know, sometimes you might have to have an awkward conversation with somebody and say, like, we need to get this woman in. And I think, yeah, just those people at the top need to make it happen and they will just immediately notice what benefit

like what

it has.

When I was at the ECB, we actively tried to get more female applicants applying for the level three and level four. And we would go out to them and then the applications would come in and they wouldn’t have applied. we’d go back to them and like, why, why didn’t you, you know, submit your application? And it goes back to something that Laura McLeod said on this.

on one of our earlier podcasts, she was talking about looking for jobs and like the set list of criteria that you need. And Laura would be like, yeah, I’ve got that. Yeah, I’ve got that. Yeah, I haven’t got that. I won’t apply. And I think it was the same with the female coaches. They were kind of looking at the criteria that we put on the application forms and they were easily put off. the male coaches.

They just kind of applied regardless. So, ⁓ that does need looking at because we do need more female coaches in the game. so yeah, Laura, Charlotte, thank you so much for coming on. think that’s been a really valuable conversation and such an important one, not just for girls cricket, but for anyone involved in the game. There’s been loads in there around engagement, confidence, and also creating environments where players actually want to

keep coming back which is ultimately what it’s all about so thank you both again we really do appreciate your time

Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank

you.

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