There have been a few books on cricket captaincy over the years. While they are all interesting to read up on, they all focus of skippering at the top level, but what about the role of the club captain?

The two jobs can be very different and not only in tactics.

Here are the 9 most important duties a club captain has:

It doesn't matter how good a player you are. Without confidence in yourself you are not going to reach your potential as a player.

Ask Marcus Trescothick.

Doubt yourself and you get frustrated, lose focus and make mistakes. Have total confidence and you will make fewer errors because you can shrug them off.

It's unlikely that you listen to much radio on the cricket field. So how are radios related to your cricket performance?

It's all to do with how your brain processes information. Even when it is seemingly unrelated.

The Sharpbrains blog explains:

"You’re driving through suburbia one evening looking for the street where you’re supposed to have dinner at a friend’s new house. You slow down to a crawl, turn down the radio, stop talking, and stare at every sign."

You may think that the aim of practice is to get better every time. Why bother practicing at all if it is not going to improve your performance on the field?

Brain expert Tony Buzan disagrees.

After 30 years of research into how your brain develops skills he has worked out that in order to reach your goals it is invetable that you will fails somewhere along the line. It's how you deal with that failure that makes you a better cricketer.

Every now and again Ill update you with my own schedule, just to give you an idea of how a club player can do it. Hopefully it will give you some context to my tips.

Thanks to my last programme I have now lost 6kg in weight and 4% body fat.

Even though it's off season things are starting to get a little bit more specific for me. My focus has moved onto strength building rather than general fitness.

In 2001, the American Heart Association advised that eating too much protein increased the risk of heart, bone and liver problems.

A bit of a problem for those on the Atkins Diet, but what has it got to do with cricket?

In short, sports players need to eat more protein than the average person does. This is because too little protein can lead to a reduction in strength and prevent increases in performance.

Liam Plunkett recently revealed his secret to keeping his energy levels up during a long day in the field.

Jelly Babies and Wine Gums

Is it worth club cricketers following suit?

Probably not. Why?

• Club cricketers tend not to spend as long in the field. So there is less need for such a boost.
• Sugary sweets give you a short term energy boost that is followed by a 'crash' as the body tries to compensate for the sudden jump in blood sugar levels. This means you get hungry and tired and your performance may drop.

I was out this morning doing some interval training at the local park. Various people were also out walking their dogs and the like. And why not? It's a beautiful day here.

I was taking a short break when a kind faced old chap carrying a tiny dog under his arm wandered up to me. The dog was in a tartan coat.

Time to train is always a problem for club players. So why not combine your usual net time with time to improve your fitness?

Twice the results in half the time.

Hopefully you are already incorporating drills to improve your fielding skill and fitness. But you can go a step further by putting some conditioning work into net practice.

Bowler Combination Net