Science-informed coaching & the rise of female quicks: Matt Mason

In this episode of Science & Shiney, Matt Mason — former Western Australia fast bowler and experienced bowling coach — joins the podcast to discuss his journey from professional cricket into coaching at the highest level.

The conversation covers his early playing career, his transition into coaching, and the key lessons he’s learned working with fast bowlers across different environments. Matt shares his coaching philosophy, including the importance of individualisation, effective communication, and the use of simple cues to support performance.

The episode also explores the development of fast bowlers in the women’s game, highlighting both the challenges and opportunities as the sport continues to grow globally.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to the Science and Shiny podcast from Fast Bowlers Limited. In this episode, we're joined by Matt Mason, former Western Australian fast bowler and now one of the leading bowling coaches in the game. Matt talks us through his journey from playing to coaching, the lessons he's learned along the way, and how his philosophy around fast bowling has developed. We also get into the challenges of coaching different players, the role of cues in communication, and Matt's work helping develop fast bowlers in the woman's game. Let's get into it.

SPEAKER_04 0:31

Hi everyone and welcome to the Science and Shiny podcast. And we're really lucky today. We've got a great guest in Matt Mason. Now, for those of you that don't know, Mace has had a glittering career as a player and then also as a coach. He made his first class debut in 1997 for Western Australia, then came over to Worcester and played for Worcester for from 2002 until 2011. He finished off with 318 first wickets at 27. That was his playing career. And then went into a coaching career which has actually moved through the ranks beautifully. You'd say the more varied coaching portfolio to look at. So started off coaching at Worcestershire County Cricket Club as their fast bowling coach when he retired from playing. Then he moved into Western Australia and coached the Western Australian men's and also the Perth Scorchers in the Big Bash. Then came back to England and worked for a couple of years at Leicestershire County Cricket Club with their men. Then went on to become England women's fast bowling coach and is currently the national lead for pace bowling for England women. Mace, that is a hell of a roster there. I've known you for a really long time, Mace. I obviously used to go to Worcester when I was doing my rounds as national lead for men's fast bowling. And I could see that there was a really, really talented young fast bowling coach then there. So much so that I took Mace to South Africa, to Poddistrom on the pace program one year. And it I saw him really, really grow as a fast bowling coach. Now we just just completed our first week on the pace program, and we normally then give the guys uh a weekend off. So if I gave the guys a weekend off and I stayed and did the programme, and I and I got a call from uh Ben Langley and he said, Shiny, we've got a problem. Now Langers didn't normally call us that often, so I thought, oh no, what's happened to one of the boys? Umce, you might want to now take this story on because I'll probably add a bit of tax to it. So if you want to take this story on, or do you want me to carry on?

SPEAKER_03 2:52

I'm really happy to for you to reinvent this because I've tried to block it out over the years, and I'm really chucked that you've brought it back to the public domain, mate. You've done me a lot of service there.

SPEAKER_04 3:02

Yeah, so so but so basically, Mace, you know, being born in Australia, you know, we're going into the bush, a bit of an adventurer. Um you know, he tried his hand at some proper bow and arrow stuff. I mean, it you're not talking you're not talking about, you know, a little, you know, a small, sort of kid's type bow and arrow. They set some targets up and it was a proper like longbow. And I I basically got a call from from Langers to say, look, I I'm really sorry, Shiny, but Mace, we've had to take him to ANE because he shot himself through the finger with an arrow. So I'm now thinking, what's going on here? How have you managed to shoot yourself through the finger with an with a with an arrow? He then sent me the photo through, and I promise you, the arrow had gone down through his finger. So good on Mace. I phoned you about, Mr. Sidney, Mace, what do you want to do? Do you want to go home? No, shiny. I'm absolutely, absolutely want to stay. The boys are taking the mick out of me enough. You know, I I think I've got to stay. He didn't pitch up that that night the biggest cartoon hand you've ever seen, and he had to stay and coke with this huge. I don't know if anyone's seen Kenny Everett.

SPEAKER_02 4:20

It's a drastic way to get out of mitig, mate. I mean, I've heard of a few stories getting out of mything, but geez, that's a drastic one.

SPEAKER_03 4:26

Oh, mate. I I actually did relive that story recently. Shiny, you remember young Karis that came with us on that trip that works for the ECB. She's in the office here today, actually. And uh we're having a chuckle about it because she was on the right hand side. She saw the arrow go in. She was the one begging me not to try and take it out. We're an hour and a half from civilization. But uh, yeah, I tend to think of that trip. I'll look back on it rather fondly, but it was always about the cricket now that you've brought that up to him. Yeah, thanks for that, mate.

SPEAKER_04 4:58

Well, I see that trip very differently, mate. I I think about it as you doing your Robin Hood impression and failing catastrophically, and I couldn't stop laughing for the rest of the trip. So thanks for amusing me on that one, Mace. I do think I got the bow and arrow emoji sent to me at the end of every one of your messages for about the next 10 years. Yeah, no, I I enjoyed that. You you you dealt with it well, mate. To be fair, fast bowlers pain's an old friend, isn't it? It was just a little bit of pain you got on gone with it with your cartoon hand, pointing it at the boys all the time.

SPEAKER_03 5:26

Far more comfortable having an arrow in your hand than bowling 25 in a day, I can tell you that much.

SPEAKER_04 5:30

Absolutely. Now, sorry, what what I also want to do is is it's I've got to mention Mace's bowling actions. It it was one of the more unusual ones. So if Mace was to probably look at his action now, um it would be interesting to see how he'd coach himself. I'm gonna suggest that you know, with those numbers, you know, averaging 27 in first class cricket, and he's actually started over in Western Australia, that's a fantastic effort. And I think one of the reasons why Mace has probably, you know, his coaching career has flourished so much is because he would look at what he did and also, you know, is that individuality the key there? So, you know, I I think as we go through this this journey through Mace's life, there'll be a maybe a bit of that as an influence as to why he wanted to go and coach, as well as the fact that bowling hurt so much. Um, Mace, can you start us off with your with your playing career and just give us a quick sort of whistle stop tour through that?

SPEAKER_03 6:29

Well, it probably led to what you just talked about there. It led to the accident you saw me bring over from West Australia. But I guess very briefly, um, was part of a very strong West Australia squad there as a youngster. Um tough, tough environment. Uh not a lot of coaching, as you can imagine. Um, back in the days when the old selection panel would come straight from the office in their suits and line themselves up across the back of the net and just sit there with their arms folded and watch you tear in for two hours, and you got the likes of you know, Moody, Langer, Gilchrist Martin lashing into all parts and just telling you to hold faster and faster. And um, so it was uh it was it was fun, but I I it was a tough team to break into. Um, but I felt like it taught me a lot about resilience, working things out for myself, um, and sort of built that grit in me to be you know determined to succeed. And I and I got a few opportunities over those few years, but not enough. I didn't do badly, but I didn't do enough to to sort of keep my place. Um so uh uh three years in that squad, and and sadly for me, which is often the case well before well-being was a thing. I remember my dad turning around and showing me a picture of the Sunday Times and West Australia listed their contracts for the following season, and my name wasn't on it. There was no there was no phone call or or rhyme or reason, it was just you just didn't get there. Um so I thought cricket wasn't for me, and I I came over to England in 2001 with my brother, who wanted to come over and play some league cricket. We went over to play in the Lincolnshire Prem just for a bit of fun, and before I decided what the real world would have in store for me. And it was during that time that Tom Moody had been my captain at Western Australia, of course, was director of cricket at Worcester. And um he knew about my Irish and English ancestry and said, Look, do you know you can play cricket in this country as a as a local? Um, to which I applied, thanks, but no thanks. You know, I didn't I didn't make it. Um I'm comfortable going back to Perth after this, which I did. I think he was a bit stunned that I turned him down. But I went and joined my my grade side playing club cricket out in Perth, and Tom was having his annual holiday, and he came over and found me during a game of cricket and said, Look, I really think you should reconsider. There's a two-year contract on the table to take some pressure off. Come on over to Worcester. I think your style of bowling would suit. So, yeah, very quickly spoke to the family about it. Um, I'm a big family person, so it was tough to leave, but they sent me on their way with their blessing and said, Look, it's what you've dreamed of doing, playing cricket for a living. So joined Worcester in 2002, and uh the rest, as they say, is is history. That started me on a completely different path. And if you'd asked me when I was a 19, 20-year-old, reading in the paper that I lost my my opportunity, I'd you know would have been a surprise. So that's that's sort of how I am where I am now, I guess. That that second chance, if you like. It's fair to say, mate.

SPEAKER_02 9:31

I was when you came over, what what what were the initial main differences you found? Like literally off the plane, start netting, play your first game. What was your what was your big sort of difference between playing at Perth, obviously with the pounce and stuff, obviously, but coming in with an English juke, and um, you know, how how was that? What did it feel like?

SPEAKER_03 9:52

I absolutely loved that jukeball, mate. I absolutely loved it. I remember my first training session when they put that juke in my hand, I went, what's this? What's this gonna do? And I saw it bend around corners. I went, yeah, I could get on well with this ball. So my initial thoughts were just excitement. Um, I'd never played in England really at any level. I thought the game was gonna be the same, if I'm brutally honest, and I suppose that was the hallmark of my career that I never complicated the game. I knew where Ost Stump was, and I wasn't gonna leave it. It didn't matter where I was playing. So I think that with a bit of skill around swing and bounce. And you know, when I first turned up the whistle, I still had a little bit of air speed, not a lot, but a bit more. And it, you know, as the career went on, I I sort of worked out that I am what I am on a workhorse, I do the do the hard graft, and I was always my goal, it was never wickets. People laugh when I say that. I wanted to walk off the ground bowling more overs than anybody else, and county cricket gave me the opportunity to do that. So my initial thoughts were that the game's the same, batteries have still got a bat. I've got to put the ball in a good area, and I've just got to do that time and time and time and time again. Um certainly in the Red Bull game.

SPEAKER_04 11:03

Yeah, Mace, can I just do it? We did just do a little coaching interlude here because I I was head coach of Somerset at the time when we played against you, and all the guys used to come off and say he's a lot quicker than he looks. So let's let's go back to to that because coaches is a weird thing, isn't it? We've got speed guns and everything now, and you'll get two bowlers that will bowl exactly the same pace, but the ball will just come off the come off the pitch differently, won't it? What's your thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_03 11:34

It's probably more the perception of the batter, really, but I do I do know what you're saying because I think trajectory makes a bit of a difference or appears to, like broad trajectory. So I was I had a pretty high release point, but I would still say that I was more along the pitch than into it, if that makes sense. So I felt like at times the ball would gather energy off the surface because it wasn't getting smashed into the pitch, so it didn't feel like it was hitting the brakes quite as hard, it was almost kissing the surface, is how I like to think of it. And I could tell when that that wasn't happening, like I I I knew pretty quickly that if I wasn't getting that sort of energy on the ball, either I wasn't doing something right or the conditions weren't conducive to that, and I'd have to change my plan. But um, yeah, I get your point. I I don't think it's something I actively coach. I I just think it's a it's one of those anomalies that release point and trajectory, and and so many things probably go into that. Um, but I think a lot of the stuff you hear spoken about shiny is probably just batter's perceptions of because I've heard the same over the years, like he really hits the bat hard or she really hits the bat hard, but when you watch it from the side, you think really it doesn't look like that.

SPEAKER_04 12:46

Yeah, and and I think one of the reasons is you know, a lot of teams now can be selected by metrics, can't they? And one of the metrics that a lot of people use is pace, and I'm pretty sure that's what England used this winter. Um, but there's more to it than that, isn't there? And especially for for coaches as well, especially a coach at your level when you'll be helping to select players onto national programs, but then there's that, you know, how do we actually, if if we're given a metric which is okay, let's let's just say 75 miles an hour, but you intuitively look at it and say, Well, that person's an international bowler, that person may not be. Is there anything that we can as coaches actually look to to try and um work on with regards to how we make them better?

SPEAKER_03 13:37

Yeah, the one thing I'd say about ball speed, and it's one of those um debates, I suppose, that gets thrown around a lot. I think of it pretty simply as um I'd like to maximize ball speeds in every potential fastball that I work with. Everyone's got a potential to hit a speed. And I think we've got an obligation, I think, to try and help them untap that potential because if it's locked away in there, we can see that it can come out, but we're not helping them access it. I think we're potentially in forwards because I think it's a measure of performance, it's an absolute output, it's a really, really key component because if you can deliver your skill quicker, then quite simply batsmen have less time. And I think that in itself is a performance advantage. Now that means that I put as much effort into my deliveries as Kabir Ali, who was someone who bowled with me for a lot, who bowled fast. I used to watch him and I'd go, you know, he is just bowling quick. I'm running in twice as far, twice as hard, and it's just not coming out with the same venom. But uh, it doesn't mean any less effort went in. My my nature of my run-up, my physical makeup, and probably one or two other things just meant that as much effort as I put in, that's probably all I was going to get out.

SPEAKER_04 14:56

Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_03 14:57

Now, having said that, when I first joined Worcester, there was no bowling coach, there was Tom Moody, Director Krugget and Damien Dolvier's second team coach. So we didn't have the coaching or any of the information for me to try and maybe explore that. I mean when you first joined up Shiny, I was at the back end of my back end of my career, really. So the horse had vaulted really by then, but I do think that um it's okay for us to explore explore pace.

SPEAKER_04 15:31

Yeah, and we'll we'll we'll get to that a little bit later because there's some good head, obviously, headliners on the work that you've done with some of the girls. So let's come to the end of your career, Mace. So you you you decided to hang the boots up. What what followed that?

SPEAKER_03 15:47

Well, in 2008 I had in shoulder surgery. I had uh a big shoulder operation and I had a long time out the game. And I've got to be very thankful to Worcester and Steve Rhodes here. He recognised as a senior player and someone who's very interested in fast bowling, there was an opportunity here to make use of that time for that year that I was out the game. Um, so he he he gave me a role of sort of mentoring the fast bowling group, um, and just being in and around, and obviously you were around then as well, and um it's certainly sparked my interest. In fact, I think giving you credit here for sure that you sparked the interest and sat me on the path to to really go for this coaching. So I did my level three really quickly in 2008, and then I wasn't sure if I was going to come back, but I did, and I had another couple of years playing again, although it was a struggle. Um I realised in those two years I've got to start thinking about the future, and I I really enjoyed that little snippet of a season of working with the bowlers. Um so when I finally retired mid-2011, um, which is quite interesting because I walked off the game, I walked off the ground during a game of cricket. Like at Worcester, I didn't even tell you what I just jumped the fence at the boundary line, never went back out there. Um and Bumfell walked up to the coach's office and he said, What are you doing up here? I said, That's me done, mate. But thankfully he was good enough to say, Well, that's all right then, because I've got a job for you. And um I moved into the coaching space at Worcester, and um it was tough because to coach in the dressing room that you'd just been playing in was really, really difficult. And I reflect on it now as having made a lot of mistakes, um, but probably did some good things, had a real thirst and hunger to learn how to be a good coach. I think it was around that time you guys suggested the level four program. Which I did and I really enjoyed. Um, and that's and that's what set me on my way. And I just spent the next five years coaching at Ulsteller, again, making lots of mistakes, learning plenty, shadowing you when I could. Um, Shiny obviously came into contact with Phelps in that time and you together up here at Loughborough, came across the likes of you, John O, because yourself and um some guys like Stuart Barnes and Neil Coleen and these guys, we had a nice little group, didn't we, of wannabe fast bowling coaches that we all kind of bounced ideas off? And um, I suppose in that time it's to grow your philosophy, don't you, about coaching?

SPEAKER_02 18:20

Can I just rewind that a little bit where you said you went from playing to coaching at the same team and you know you found that difficult? What what was that? What did you find difficult and how did you sort of change it if that makes sense? How did you cross the line, I suppose?

SPEAKER_03 18:36

Yeah, I being really honest, I got some stuff wrong around um coaching is so much about relationships, isn't it? It's so much about relationships. If you've got good relationships with people, you can get them to do difficult things. Um, and I had relationships with these guys, but and I think I was complacent thinking that those relationships would be strong enough when I crossed the fence and went into the coaching space, but actually they're very different relationships, and it's almost that poacher turn gamekeeper a little bit. I was trying to let them know that I've made the switch. I'm definitely over here now, I'm not one of you, and maybe I just didn't get that bit right. So probably went a little bit too hard, a little bit too keen. Um, tried to do stuff that I thought was right without probably having the right knowledge or the right uh evidence. Um so I'd say that on the back of that, some relationships got quite strained, um, some stayed really strong, and there was some new ones formed. So it was tough on me because um I'm all about that whole relationship bit, and some of them fractured just because I got that little bit of coaching messaging wrong. But um the plus side is it's helped me grow as a coach, definitely set me on a good path.

SPEAKER_02 19:55

Yeah, it's the difficult, it's a difficult transition. I had a similar one when I went to Middlesex where I'd played there a year before, had a small gap, and then went back. And I I was I was with you on that one. It it you are you're not a player anymore, you're a coach, and and as you grow into the role, you realise there is a real difference between the two entities, really. And you do make a lot of mistakes on the way. Yeah, um that's a good thing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 20:24

How do you um how do you so to without naming names, what what would have been the that the type of mistake you made, and then how did you recover from it?

SPEAKER_03 20:35

Probably just trying uh well, two things. Some of it's forced upon you because of the messaging coming from the top down. You're also an assistant coach, so you've got a duty of care to to try and impart the the messaging of the head coach at times, and and also because we had such small staff, Shiny, it was really, really hard because you're wearing a lot of hats. So on the one hand, you're telling a guy that you're working with as a bowler that he's developing really nice, you're doing some really great things, and you're really, really encouraging, and you're hammering about his fielding two minutes later because he's you know what I mean, because it's just not gone so well, and you've suddenly got your fielding coach's hat on, and I think it just made I mean it just muddied the waters. So that was really, really hard. And I I know now that it's so important when you're trying to go through change or work with a fast bowler, and I think England probably saw that this year in the ashes. You've got to be with them, you've got to be with them in the trenches, you've got to be so attach yourself to the hip. You become a part of their life, and that sometimes becomes difficult if you've got too many too many hats, or you know, you're trying to build a relationship on the one part, but you may be tearing it down over here when you're having to go doing something else, and it I think that's where it got a little bit blurred. Yeah, so you were doing two roles then, effectively. Yes, you were. You were well, you're doing everything, you were doing so much because we had three coaches and we're also working on academies and trying to do you know, these smaller clubs don't have. Have all the resources. Um, so that puts pressure on your coaching, and um and I think that classic I'm learning all this stuff, I'm speaking to so many people. I spoke to Shiny, I spoke to Phillips, I spoke to John, I've got all this great information, I'm gonna just throw it on you, and you're gonna do it. You know, yeah, I definitely did that. Like we've all been there.

SPEAKER_04 22:19

That's a that's a tricky thing.

SPEAKER_03 22:21

I think that's just maybe that's the journey every coach. We've all been there. Yeah, I think maybe that's just part of it.

SPEAKER_01 22:30

Um you talked a lot about your early years then not having a massive like mentor or coach in terms of bowling. What how did you start on your coaching journey in terms of what you believed in and what you wanted to take forward for the players? Did you read around stuff or did you just go with what you learned over your career?

SPEAKER_03 22:47

I think um probably a bit of everything. I I I definitely went out and researched a lot of stuff. I definitely went and sought out information from a lot of people. I remember uh one of the most valuable things I heard in my level four course was from a guy, I think you might have to correct me here. He was just Jeff Ennis' um coach, Tony Minicello. Does that ring a bell? Yep. And he said, read everything. Just read stuff. So I was finding stuff to look at, I was looking at stuff on videos, I was watching other fastballers, I got told to be a sponge by so many people, and then start to filter and drill down eventually over time on what you think's important and build your own philosophy around that and try and make it as simple as you can, which is hard when you're actively seeking all the information. But that's what that's sort of what I did. And I suppose I always had a deep-seated want to take care of people because I didn't have that experience when I was a player. So when I was in Western Australia, you were just literally I was literally a number and fancy as old. So my going back even a further step, so my bowling action, I coached that myself because I was in a whacker program. I know, and it sounds awful, but I was in a whacker program as a young under 18, broke down with this rest fracture as we all seem to have done at that age. They wanted to put a screw in my back when I was 17 years of age. And I my mum came with me to that consultation and she went, There's no way you're putting screws through my son's growing back. And the option you had then was to go 12 months with nothing, and all I got told by someone was you probably need to get more front on, and that'll help you back. No coaching, just get front on. Um, so I came up with this way, and Charlie could describe it better than I could, of just trying to keep my shoulders and hips as square onto the target as I could.

SPEAKER_04 24:41

Yeah, yes, for people who might not have seen Mace bowl, there's a guy called Andre Nell, who uh South African, who had a fairly similar well, it's a very rare approach, isn't it, Phelps, to actually stay square on all the way through your bowl in action. And pretty much that's what it was. And I think actually, Mace, what going back to that the games we played against you, a lot of the guys found you very hard to pick up because it was so unusual, and that was one of the other things when we're as coaches when we talk about individuality and not coaching it out, not just wanting to coach what looks good. You know, that that I think that's pretty important.

SPEAKER_03 25:17

I think that's a really important point. And I've always learned now, especially to embrace the unorthodox. Like um, you see a lot of it, particularly in the women's game, you see some different types of actions, and young adult adolescent boys now. We see lots of different stuff, and uh, I suppose it comes back to as long as it's safe, it's not hurting them, and is it conducive to high performance? I suppose in my example, certainly I didn't have another back injury for 20 years, so it's sort of it sorted that out. I didn't get a lot of injuries, I bought a lot of overs. I think the question would be did the pace fit by doing that and not understanding that I needed maybe certain other things to be working better for me. Did I end up because I was the classic old mixed action, if you want to call it anything else, you know, side on at the bottom, semi-sidon at the top, and I used to just wang the thing down there as a youngster. I I just rubbed myself, I think I'll probably just rub myself with pace. Um but had other other things that went well when I was performing, so I suppose I just leave I lived with it.

SPEAKER_04 26:21

Once again, once again, as coaches, we come back to the you know, so why did you do it because you got injured, you didn't want to have a s have a screw put in your back. Yeah, so what did you then do? You made some adjustments based on some pretty good advice at that particular time. And when we look at, you know, coaches, we can't just look at one headline. You know, generally you you can find in fast bowling it's the fast, but you maybe found a high release point, you maybe found a better balance point to be able to then bowl your different skills. You know, it's it's one of those things that if you can't do something that people maybe want you to do, there are always other ways to explore, and that's the beauty of cricket, isn't it? Because you've got pace, bounce, movement, control, you know, many, many things that you could become brilliant at, and that's why you know I'd encourage every single coach out there to look at the game as a whole, not just in isolation. And you know, there are many, many successful players. We saw that, didn't we, this this winter? It wasn't all about pace.

SPEAKER_03 27:21

Yeah, I think the beauty about the modern player, I think, though, is they are going to have coaches around them that can help them bring out that performance and and give a lot more understanding and clarity around why we change or why we don't change. And whereas I didn't have any of that. I just got get open and with your own. I can't help but think if I'd had coaching, I could have come up with a different version of that that might have been more conducive to some of the other things that were lacking, I suppose.

SPEAKER_04 27:51

But maybe that's where your curiosities come out now, and I and and this is where we're gonna go with this next bit. We're gonna bring you and Feltz together on this. So you went over to Australia and you you you coached Western Australia, um, and you had uh Cameron Green and people like Jesus, Jai Richardson as well, wasn't it? You'd had bowlers like that. So you you had some pretty you know, some pretty talented guys to work with. Unfortunately, Cameron Green picked up some back problems, didn't he? And and and you not only were equipped to help him, but you were actually able to pull on some different advice, weren't you?

SPEAKER_03 28:27

Yeah, so to give everyone a brief rundown, I joined West Australia in 2019. Two weeks after I arrived at the club, Cameron Green went down with his fourth consecutive stress fracture. So he had four and four years. Um 21 years of age, six foot seven, big lads, wonderful athlete, but as Phelps will probably lead to an action not conducive to good health, I'd say. But because he'd been doing okay and shown so much promise, and he was largely in a system where a lot of the advice was more about getting stronger and that'd have been continued. Once he gets stronger, he'll be okay. Once he gets stronger, he'll be okay. So I sat down with Cam after this, and I felt there was other things we could do, and we had to break the cycle of this injury because he was talking about walking away from Bolling, and I think we'd all agree that would have been just a shame because he's obviously a talented batter. He was he said, I'm just I'm just not gonna do it, Mace. I'm just gonna be a batter. And I was like, We can't we cannot let that happen. But I also knew that my knowledge extended so far, but this was gonna take more than just my knowledge because I was so desperate to get this right that I wanted to check myself. And I think one of the greatest things we've got to realize as coaches is we don't know everything, and we've got to be humble enough to ask and ask for help. So I reached out to the the big man there, Paul Felton, in the middle of the night because of the time difference. I was in Perth, he was in England, and we just started a conversation up around um, I've got these sort of thoughts, Felt, this is what we're looking at. Um you've got a much more biomechanical, scientific type lens on it. I've got a slightly different lens as a coach. What information can we sort of share and knock about to try and make sure we give this young lad the best advice we can. Um and and try and give him the most simple things to help him get in the best position possible and resume his resume his career. Um that's a very simplified version of it, isn't it, Phelps? That there was a lot of stuff going back and forth over a lot of nights.

SPEAKER_01 30:43

Yeah, I think I I think to bring me into this story, I think I met Mace shortly after he shot himself in the hand with an Aryx. Um, we've been a pain in my side ever since then as well, in terms of I think we had Charlie Morris at one point shiny. I think that was probably one of the key pieces of work that I learned a lot from in terms of don't try and force techniques onto people that can't produce those techniques. Um, and I've mostly met Mace when he was in and around the pace program a little bit before that. Um, and interestingly I think one of my first memories of you, Mace, was working with one of the England females, trying to get him to do something through back foot contact. So I've always kind of had you in the back of my head, like working with the girls really early and learning from that side and their differences as well. Um, but yeah, I think going forward to the Western Australia story, it was a perfect storm. I think we had the research coming out that Pete always done, which is fantastic, and hadn't quite been published yet, Shiny. So I worked in an office with Pete, and Pete was looking at stress fractures, how they develop from a workload point of view, how lumbar spine density improves and changes with workload. Um, and we were working on a paper around technique characteristics and stress fractures at the same time. Um, and then COVID happened, so suddenly we had a lot more time, and I'll be honest, Mace probably kept me out of a dark mental circle of teaching, repeat, and like working 13, 14 hours a day in academia trying to produce content and keep students happy to have something to talk about at the end of the day was quite cool. Um but we hadn't tried it and it wasn't really out there because it, as you know, Shiny, with research, like we've worked together on stuff and we've been working on stuff, and it's like five years later that everybody else finds out when it's published. We had an opportunity with Cameron to try and put in practice some of the stories and the lessons we were learning from the research from Pete. So I was quite lucky that I was able to translate that with Mace and put it in practice, and Cameron was the beneficiary of it. But Pete alway has a huge um level of respect as well for um to this story as well, because without his work, we wouldn't have been able to do it either. So um, yeah, fun times. I think both of us nearly got divorced. The amount of times we were on the phone at 1 a.m. in the morning getting told to uh pack it in and come back. Um and that's where it really started. And I that the thing that you started with, mate, I think was really interesting where you said about get a little bit stronger. I remember having a conversation with you around him being the strongest in the squad, but he couldn't get into the positions he needed to or hold the positions, which bowling strength is a really interesting thing as well, in terms of how we measure it in the gym versus what we actually need to do in bowling actions. I think I learned we learned a big lesson there as well. Um, and the story with the physio around we need him in this position. Well, he can get in that position, he's really flexible, and then you pulling him into the position and him screaming for the next week.

SPEAKER_02 33:34

Um are we allowed to ask without getting into detail anything that that you did with him that that was different that changed?

SPEAKER_01 33:42

I think Cameron has always been fairly open that we can talk about a story. He's given me permission to present it in the past and chat about it, so I think we're okay. Um, do you want to start off with where we started, Mace?

SPEAKER_03 33:52

I think well, the the whole process was really like like any coaching journey, it was understanding where he was now, where we thought we could get him to, um, but accepting, and this is where Phelps kept me on the straight and narrow. I was trying to go for perfect, and Phelps was saying, well, that's not attainable. But we can move towards it, we can more move towards better and accepting that there is some risk that you've got to you've almost got to accept an element of risk because what we didn't want to do is take away his performance. I think that's a really interesting point straight away that there was no point changing him, and then he becomes 125k an hour Dobber. He didn't want that, and we didn't want that. Um so we had to keep some of his X factor for want of a better word, and keep his but we knew that we were going to try and get there differently. Um so it was just the usual, took a lot of footage, um, had a look at it myself, thought about a few things about the fact he would know it was a big change of direction at you know, jump gather, he would cross over, he would he'd block off that back leg, he'd lots of lateral flexion and all the stuff that you don't want was happening. Um the other bit you need to know about Cameron, and he won't mind me saying this, Cameron needs real simplicity, particularly around his bowling. And this was going to be the key thing throughout the whole thing. How can I take Phelps' messaging, which can be, with the greatest respect, quite heavy at times, and he's a scientist. I has been fast bowling with a slightly limited brain capacity, working with a fast bowler with probably more limited. So we had to try and dumb the messaging down, which I think is really important, because ultimately, when you stood there on the grass with Cam, I needed to give him one key. I had to try and get all this stuff that Felt just talking about, all this research, all this interesting, amazing stuff, into a bloke who can compute one thing at a time. Yeah. And that's when the relationship and all the other stuff became really important. The patience, you know, become a punching bag for Cam when he was getting frustrated. Um, all that stuff that goes into coaching, that really got tested in that. Um, which is why I think it's such a great story, a great example. Yeah, you could probably talk a bit more to the structure.

SPEAKER_01 36:14

I'd say loads of lessons out of this because we got a lot wrong, I think is a good way of putting it as well. Like we the the endpoint we were happy with, but um we learnt a lot of lessons along the way. I think the interesting thing for me was how many toys we made, like we sort of ended up with, which I don't think we'd ever go down that route again if we were to do it. Um, and I remember reviewing it with you, Shiny, at one point, and you just said to me, Why don't you just put a gate at the end rather than having all of these poles and cones? And um, the thing that I learned from it was how long it takes, constraints-wise, when you start putting things in, once you start trying to take them out again, it they just default back, and how long it takes to actually go from things in to things out from a coaching and skill development point of view. Um, in terms of what we worked on, I think it was fairly simple, wasn't it, Mate? In terms of we didn't really want him to change direction in the before he got to back foot contact. Um, that was where most of the problems had revolved. And it's interesting because I think it goes back to alluding to a little bit what you had in your early career of if he went into a program and they said don't do this, or if you don't want to be mixed, either get side on or get front on, and he'd gone side on, and to get side on, he started to change direction, and then that had caused an even bigger problem, which I think back 20 or 25 years ago was a message that you don't want to be mixed, but the more recent research shows about 80% of all bowlers are mixed, and there's not really that much of a link between them or not, it just seemed to be a category of people that were more likely to get injured. So I think now we're moving away from it, but actually the coaching of going more front on probably kept you healthier, mate. Whereas if you'd gone more side on, it probably would have been a bigger problem. Um I think players forked when they got that advice 20-25 years ago, and it made some more likely and some less likely to carry on getting injured. Um so yeah, with Cameron, we just tried to change his alignment, and I think we spent a long time trying to get him to work with that. And I remember you sending me videos every night of him smacking his head on poles and nearly taking an eye out. And I was probably scared of a very similar phone call shiny from a physio going, we've got a problem here. Uh Cameron's got an eye on the end of a pole and he's in hospital having it reattached. Some of the poles that some of the pictures I've got, and I still use them in Coach Ed now where he's smacking his forehead on poles as he's side flexed, and it sounds like a train going down a track. Um but it was I don't think there's a lot of coach, it wasn't a I don't want to say it wasn't a lot of coaching work to the disservice to you, Mace, but we didn't change a lot, it just took a long, long time to get that change washed in to keep him healthy.

SPEAKER_03 38:44

Yeah, then that I think ultimately is half the battle of coaching is the time you need because you're you're working with quite often an anxious individual. They're often scared of change because it is can be a scary place. Um, it can be very frustrating to make something that you've never thought about very conscious. I mean, there's so many things that go into this whole coaching thing that people don't realize. And the re you know, the reason for the polls and the idea around that was to try and almost simplify it again, an implicit way of coaching him, giving him evidence that he could change position. And the key to it was though, he had to be able to tell us what he was doing differently to solve the puzzle that was put in front of him, if you like.

SPEAKER_04 39:33

Mace, can a quick quick quick question? You mentioned cues. Can you just explain what your your take on cues is and maybe some examples of them?

SPEAKER_03 39:42

Yeah, I I tend to try rather than give cues, I try and get the player to come up with a cue. So I I I might say to them, look, I really need you to um think about getting your back foot down quicker or something like that. Poor example, I need you to get your back foot down quicker. So I'll ask the player, what does that mean to you? What what could you tell yourself to do that for me? And it might be something as simple as fill the floor or you know, make contact or drive drive knee, but the player will come up with something, and it might not even be that it might be a tenuous link to what you're actually asking, but if it connects that player to that movement, then it's it's the right cue. And I think using cues helps them do the things that you want them to do without getting too scientific and too messy into having in your language, and then it's trying to make the whole bowling action. Can you make that simply one cue or two cues? Um I think if a player has the cue, then your role changes a little bit then on game, but they don't need you as much. So when they're out in the middle, they're out in the heat of battle, they're as somewhere else in another part of the world. I know what this means. I've got my cues, and my cues look like this, they feel like this. Um they don't they're not sitting there waiting for a coach to point to them and go, you know, or they're not getting a list of things they want you to do first, run at this speed, jump here, put this arm there, that foot there. So that's sort of what I mean by cue.

SPEAKER_04 41:18

Yeah. Yeah, it's nice. It all it's almost um sort of it's almost that list in one word or one small phrase, isn't it? Yeah. So if it can, it's like jump straight.

SPEAKER_02 41:31

And then you have to work out how to do that. I quite like I quite like what you said earlier as well about that there is a lot of trial and error, isn't there? You know the position you want the bowler to get into that's gonna help him, but there are different ways of getting there. So let's try this, and then don't be afraid to go, well, that's not working. That's okay, though. We can move on to this and do something a bit different. And it I think that's quite important with coaching as well, where don't just think this is the one thing, this is gonna work, and if it doesn't work, I failed. That's rubbish. You actually look at a different angle, look at a different way of getting that position. There's lots of different ways of doing it.

SPEAKER_03 42:07

That's really great, Johnny, because I totally agree with that. You just comes back to the humility piece as a coach, doesn't it? And I think you can set that up really well with your player. Really? I think you can really say to look, we're gonna explore this. It may or may not work, but that's okay, but we need to give it a period of time. We won't spend months doing it, we might spend a week, and let's see how we go. Are we making a step closer to our goal or actually getting further away? And if we're getting further away, we'll change it and we'll go with something else because these things do just take time. And um, you don't always have it, sadly, because there's always pressures, but yeah. Fund me, it's um I love what you said there. I think that's so true. Just know that it doesn't always work and it's okay.

SPEAKER_01 42:49

Yeah, I think for me, like that's the rawest form of science. Like, if you go back to school about like what you used to do your experiments, it was like, we'll try something, we'll write down what happened and we'll write and report it. I think we forget sometimes that actually trial and error is the rawest form of science. You might have a good idea for some research that says this should happen, but actually you need to go back and check does it happen, and if it doesn't, then that's fine and you can work on something else and then record that and see whether that works for the player or not. Um, so I kind of always try and tell coaches they are almost the or the original scientists in the trial and error and stuff like that. And I think our relationship, Mesa, has led to a lot of research questions just from trying trial and error. And we had Cam, we've had Charlie and us. Obviously, we did AJ, Ty, and Jai over at the period you were with WA as well. Um, Shiny, do you think we should uh move back to this side of the world and when Mace came back to Warwickshire and talk about some of the stuff with the girls? Leicestershire, mate. He came to Leicestershire. Did you do Warwickshire as well? Yeah. Yeah. Did you?

unknown 43:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:50

It's been on the phone to me for most of it, mate. So I know where it's been.

SPEAKER_03 43:53

Was Warwickshire before Leicestershire? No, so it got a little way right a little way uh around the wrong way, but it was around

SPEAKER_04 44:00

Yeah, yeah, because you you won the championship, didn't you?

SPEAKER_03 44:03

West uh West Australia.

SPEAKER_04 44:06

And then back to Warwickshire, then into England with us. That's right, 'cause I remember you uh in that that was COVID year, you were the fast bowling coach, weren't you, for Warwickshire?

SPEAKER_03 44:15

Yeah, I did did three years out at no one uh 2019 to 2022 I was in um in Australia, then did a year when I got back with Warwickshire. That's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 44:28

Because you you burgled the um you burgled that championship off of knots at that particular time because we we finished with more points than you if you'd have measured it on points win prizes, but they decided not to do it like that.

SPEAKER_03 44:41

That was the year before I arrived.

SPEAKER_02 44:46

I'm blaming you for it. The good thing is you're not good at holding on to that signed on.

SPEAKER_01 44:53

We're listening to two guys trying to work out what year where they were doing something.

SPEAKER_04 44:57

Yeah, the post trip is we can cut that. Um so Mace, you let let's move you on. We we got we got amazing evidence of you your quality of your coaching because Cameron Green's moving on now, he's staying injury free. You know, there's never any guarantees, is there, but it looks like the work that you did there was quality. Um, you know, there are many, many men who've benefited from your coaching and your coaching style, the fact that you will, you know, you're humble enough to go and seek different opinions, you know, whether it's from someone like Feltz, who's got amazing scientific knowledge, um, you know, or other other fast bowling coaches that you've met along the way. So now let's move towards the women's game. What actually happened with regards to the move from the men's to the women's game?

SPEAKER_03 45:49

Um I think I just felt ready to take on something a little bit bigger. Yeah. And I I sense that um, you know, I've never worked at international level, not in a full-time capacity. And I also being around Warwickshire in particular, and also having dabbled a little bit with um coaching some of the females in Western Australia, got a real appreciation for proper fast bowling coaching again because I had so much um so much hunger and desire to get bats out, but there was a lot I felt like I could do and help with. So when you're dealing with the likes of Jai Richardson and Cameron Green and you know Jason Birdle and some of these guys, they're they're almost a finished article and you're just putting little bits on, but the girls were crying out, I think, for more. And then when and I really enjoyed the experience with coaching them, they just they just are different, and but in a really positive way. So when this opportunity came up, I thought, well, great, I get to do something at an international level, which will really challenge me, and work in a space where fast bowling is still a little bit unknown, there's very little research, almost a bit of a blank canvas, and feel like I can make an impact somewhere. So that was the real driver behind it. Um, and now three and a bit years in, I would say the game has moved forward quite a lot in the fast bowling space. We are getting a little bit more information than we used to have. I've learned a lot about coaching, again, which has been nice to be challenged and think differently about the world because as we'll find out, they do do things a little bit differently. Um and I'm still finding out a lot more about them now as as fast bowlers. I mean, the the current crop that I'm working with now are just better athletes, they're doing different things, they just look different, they they bowl differently. Um, we are starting to see actually some shapes that are probably a little bit more like the men's game now because they're better athletes, and some of them can actually hit some of those positions. So it's a very ice thing thing.

SPEAKER_04 47:45

Can I ask an obvious can I uh now ask the obvious question because I haven't worked in women's cricket. Would I coach in women's cricket the same as I do in men's? You know what would be the major differences, you know.

SPEAKER_03 47:59

Um well I think there's how can I say this? There's obviously the technical element of coaching, there's obviously how they are as the way that uh female athletes do things, um, which Phelps will help me explain, I'm sure, a little bit later on. Says there's being aware of the nuances of coaching them from a technical point of view, and that also probably covers off some of the physical differences that we have to be really aware of. And then there's the other traits uh that are different too. Like I find that the girls are far more emotionally driven, but that's a very positive thing. They care so much, they're very, very diligent, they listen intently, they question all the time, they want to know why all the time, which I think every young athlete should always ask. Why are we doing it? Why are we doing it? They do that really, really well. And they've got this absolute appetite just to get better. Um, I'm not saying the men don't, but it's just a little bit more obvious because it feels like they're trying to play catch up, so they're like, give me the next, I want to do what I want to do what they're doing, and it it's it's just awesome. And obviously, it's just I find that I have to and I love doing this for it, I just invest a lot more in them all around the clock, if that makes sense. They really enjoy having more.

SPEAKER_02 49:21

You walk into the game, and there's suddenly you know, you you you're saying that you had to coach differently. Where did you pick up that information? Was it about asking loads of people or did you just discover it?

SPEAKER_03 49:32

I think probably a little bit of both. John I so I spoke to some people that have coached. I knew I know Lisa Kitley, who worked in the as head coach of the England Women. I knew her from when she was at Western Australia. Tim McDonald, who was doing this role before me, is now working with Western Australia, and I know Tim. So I was able to tap into him a little bit, but then I wanted to figure it out for myself. I wanted to experience it. Um like any new environment, when you go in, you've got to sort of sit back, don't you? You can't just go straight in, you've got to sit back and just sort of look at what's around you and start to observe and understand and ask good questions and put yourself into situations where you're you're learning from them as much as they're learning from you, and then you sort of build a picture of each player of how to work with them. Um but yeah, it's just a very, very different experience. But I think the main point, if we just get down to the bare bones of coaching shiny, is they just do it differently, and you just need to be aware of that.

SPEAKER_04 50:33

So, what it's a get what are the headlines with regards to where they'll do it differently?

SPEAKER_03 50:40

I think Phelps, you feel free to jump in there too, because I know you've done some stuff on this, but and correct me if I say anything incorrectly, mate, why you but they're probably a little bit more of a hybrid version of what we consider a good technique might be for a male fast bowler. So they tend to engage what looks like, and again, Phelps will probably shoot at me here. They spend a bit more time in the bowling action recruiting what looks like a lot of strength to bowl. They use a lot of rotation, they try and set themselves up to use rotation to bowl. Um, yeah, that's that would be the number one thing. They often momentum's interesting how they transfer it, or sometimes don't. Um, whether that's through physical prowess or just the technique they adopt, it's how do they get the the right velocity in the run-up to then that equals performance and not detrimental to their performance. Let's say a lot of girls probably run a little bit too fast at times initially, um which impacts them. It's just understanding that. And I suppose it's like anything, Shawnee. If you've ever coached a um, I mean this with the greatest respect, an adolescent male who isn't quite yet strong enough or robust enough and runs in really fast and tries to adopt what's more akin to a throwing position by using lots of rotation, they're very, very similar. I would say, wouldn't that be accurate, Colts?

SPEAKER_01 52:08

Yeah, I think hybrid's a really great word for this because if I think most people would think of hybrid as cars, and I think there's two energy systems in terms of momentum in I think fast bowling, it goes through males as well when they're different stages of their development and ages and sizes, but you can develop momentum from your run-up and you can develop momentum within the kinetic chain as you go from front foot contact to ball release using your muscles. So understanding what females can do or what any player can do depends on how much momentum you've got from either source. And typically the technique that we've seen in male or elite males is very dominated by run-up momentum, and whatever time you've got left, you try and generate some more momentum from your muscles, but it's around 100 milliseconds, which is about the time you've got for one muscle to go from zero to a hundred. So across a whole system, you haven't got loads of time, um, and range of motion, etc. So the ball's out before you even uh can fire any of those muscles. With the females, it all slows down, so you've got loads more, or you've got probably 40 to 50 more time. You can then start to fire those big torsional muscles that are great for developing momentum when you throw. And I think the conversations me and Mace have around females are so individualised because some of them are really good at holding run-up speed and holding it through, and they won't rotate as much, and we're looking at it and going, What should we do here? And then you've got some that run up a lot slower but are really powerful, can rotate and get velocity that way. So trying to work out what their potential is, like Mace said earlier, in terms of.

SPEAKER_04 53:41

Just stop there for me. Can you so so when you talk about rotation? Can you give a uh an example, strokes, sort of illustrative example of that for us?

SPEAKER_01 53:51

Yeah, so I think the easiest way to picture the what the rotation I'm talking about is in men, I probably shouldn't in people that prioritize run-up momentum, you'll see trump flexion. So you'll see that rotation where there everything is brake hard, momentum flies everything forward. A bit like if you drive into a wall on a motorbike, you'll fly off it because all your momentum takes you or carries you on. In throwing actions, when you're using your muscles, you'll tend to rotate your uh shoulders. So it's the rotation like if you've picked something up and you're trying to spin around on the spot, it's that sort of rotation. And in all sports that are throwing or hitting, generally, the more what we call shoulder pelvis separation, the further you'll throw it or the further you'll hit it. So the girls are using a combination of developing that separation and then closing it versus adding in some of the run-up as well.

SPEAKER_04 54:45

So by separation, you're saying one goes forward, one goes back, if you look at it as simply as that.

SPEAKER_01 54:50

Yeah, if you want it to be like so I talk a lot on coach development, if you take a five to eight to ten-year-old and you give them a ball, they generally don't know how to run up because their coordination of a run-up and bottom. But what they'll do is they'll almost like discus throw it out. So they're almost completely rotational to develop their speed. If you go all the way down the line to say a Brett Lee or even a Jai Richardson who's really fast with their run-ups, you won't see that much rotation. It'll all be front foot block, everything flies over the top, and it'll be very rotational in that direction. Between those two extremes, the strategies and the movement patterns you adopt to develop speed is a hybrid of the two systems, the run-up momentum and the muscular momentum. And men typically are very confined in a space because most of them have the same run-up speeds and they're able to handle that with the strengths that we've developed in the their development and this far further on in the pressurization. The females is such a wide span in terms of what their fitness, their strength, their size, their shapes, um, what they can do from a female physiological point of view compared to males, it's it's so individualized. So me and Mace have some great conversations, and it it's all plugged into like my kind of thinking around fast bowling now, that development through. But um, you know, so much more we need to be so aware of it. I think when Mace was talking about like how you'd coach differently, I honestly think if you tried to coach the framework or the pace matrix line as we used to talk about it, into the females, I'd say half of them would slow down because they would they'd lose that rotational momentum that helps them with their ball speed.

SPEAKER_04 56:33

So can I give you three names now so you two can give us some snapshots on how what you've just mentioned there about technique might be applied? So we've got um Lauren Bell, Izzy Wong, and Lauren Filer. Would you coach them the same or have they got um have they got differences?

SPEAKER_03 56:56

I think I probably group Bell and Filer reasonably similar. Filer's probably a more extreme end of rotation, um, and there was a lot of speed in doing it. Um but again the the caveat to that is it's it's quite a stressful bowling action and it does take a physical toll on her.

SPEAKER_04 57:20

What's she being clocked at, Mace?

SPEAKER_03 57:22

Last year in the summer she bowled the fastest clocked over of any female fast bowl that's ever been. I think the average speed was 78 point something miles an hour, which is good pace for the women's game, and it was a fast over. It was at the oval. She's generally up over 75 miles an hour consistently. Yeah. Um, but there is a physical toll to that. I mean, she lit she literally, as we talked about, spends a lot of time in that crease recruiting every bit of strength she's got and rotation she can find to get the thing down there. Now, the trade-off of get of that, besides the physical, is the outcome. It means a lot of what you're doing is working across the plane of the stumps and not necessarily down the plane of the stumps. So then things like consistency control can be one of the things that you forego to a point. She's worked really, really hard on her consistency over the years and is far, far better than she was. But it's understanding that. So we might look at her and go, if we didn't know any different, we tried to make her something else, she'd probably lose her ball speed.

SPEAKER_01 58:26

Can I jump in there, mate? Because I had come across Lauren, I did some consultancy work with Western Storm a long time ago, and she was one of the girls that they asked me to have a look at, and the alignment was so off that I don't think she was in their plans. And we talked about just changing her alignment a little bit, and she flew. I think she went from not having a contract to being in the England side within six or twelve months, it was crazy. Um, but I think that's a great example as well of like how individual I like almost how you think about how they're different to get the best out of them. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 59:01

So I do think you can hand that rotational movement, but you can have it in the straighter plane, definitely. You can you can control it within a certain yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:10

Shiny likes the word bandwidth. She's definitely one that if you get within the bandwidth, she'll fly, and as soon as you're outside the bandwidth, anything could happen, I think. Absolutely. And we're talking sweet spot or bandwidth, aren't we?

SPEAKER_03 59:20

Yeah. And and Lauren Bell's a really good example because she's changed. So, as you probably read, she's gone from being a big floaty insuling bowler to now being able to bowl. She's five miles an hour quicker than she was in 2022. And she's actually a really good advert of becoming a bit more of that hybrid. So rather than just falling off the ball and rotating on one leg, she's now actually got a bigger base of support. She's taller, she's behind the ball, she's stronger. Yeah. And in doing that, she can swing the ball both ways.

SPEAKER_04 59:51

And she's also Mace, just on that. So I I try and see, you know, as you get as you get older and you coach more, you you almost like try and put a word to it. And I I I've read with a lot of interest actually the work you were doing with Lauren Bell because you were trying to get her to concentrate more on a skill, weren't you? Which is fabulous because it's it's it's good. Stick with me on this. So I remember first seeing Lauren being more of a push bowler, and then she had more of a shape of really pulling energy into the ball. Um, would would you say, you know, when we're talking about rotation and momentum, etc.? I know you remember Phelps. Remember, I'm incredibly simple. I sort of try and see patterns and energy and stuff like that. That's why you you and I had a tricky relationship to start with because you could tried to shove maths and sums at me, and I said, no, just give me pictures and easy phrases to get hold of, which you did brilliantly at the end, by the way. So, would it be as simple as the fact that you've in your hybrid um sort of world, Lauren's actually found something that is you know more um more successful for her, and she wouldn't have done that without coaching. Now, I'm not asking you to big yourselves up, this is purely about being open to um getting great information from someone like a Feltz and then having to understand it and see if you can put it into your game. Because remember, there's risk involved in that, isn't there? She was an international player to start with.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:20

Yeah, she was, and she was having some success. But if Lauren's desire is to become the best bowler in the world, and we felt to do that, two things had to happen. We had to put her in a slightly safer position because what hasn't been talked about is she was getting sore. She was starting to have some hip and back problems from the position she was delivering the ball in, and as she was bowling more and more and more and playing more cricket, we felt she was at risk, and that was our green light, I guess, to go. Well, we can make her what we believe to be a far better version of herself if we change this release position, get her in a safer position, and guess what will happen? She'll be behind the ball and she'll swing it. How are we okay to do that? And then the rest is history. It was a tough old year and a half of work, but she got there and yeah, she's more behind the ball now. I think the ball speed increase came from redirecting that energy. She still uses rotation, but it's better directed as Elvis talked about. And if you and if you she's a really good example, Sean, if you were to apply the pace matrix to Hunter, she wouldn't do probably any of those things. Maybe he'll strike.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:33

Sorry, did you have to take around the game to do these changes, mate? So did you drip feed in?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:37

Um this was the great challenge that has been well documented, and I copped a lot of flack for this, and I don't mind because I was supported, and I think that's really key. That when John Lewis was the head coach at the time and being a fast bowling coach himself, he understood that the goal we set ourselves it was doable. The caveat was from Lauren, Lauren wants to play for England, she values it above all else. She did say that if I'm going to miss games for England, I might have to think twice about doing this. So we were like, right, can we do this? Can we do this on the cold face of international cricket? And my god, was it a challenge? And if you ever get Lauren on, and you should, because she's amazing, she'll be an amazing guest. Um a lesser character wouldn't have been able to do it because it was tough because she was exposed. She was exposed at the highest level. Um there's a game at Durham where she broke down on the field. Um, I rang her the next morning. She basically, I said, You okay? She says, Mace, you've changed my action. I'm now a crap bowler. How do you think I'm going? That was her exact words. As a coach, it's quite hard to hear.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:54

That's tough.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:55

It is tough, but it's okay because I I knew that deep down we were doing the right thing. Two games later, she gets her first ODI Piffer, and suddenly she's off. She's off and flying, and that was all the evidence she needed there.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:09

Oh, by the way.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:10

Yeah, no, there was no call.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:13

To be fair, Mace. That's coaching, isn't it? Yeah, I've been there as well, Mace. The the bloke down the bottom there in Johnno, I destroyed his career.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:24

And it's coaching, you you support and butter for your player, and when they go well, you throw them out there and you let everyone celebrate them. And when having a tough day, you just gotta throw yourself in between, you almost catch the bullet at you. And that's that's what it's about.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:38

But yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:39

But that was a wonderful experience, and um it was tough, John. I'm doing it that and I wouldn't do it again. And to be honest with you, it was probably one of the catalysts for my move across to this program that I'm in now because the development space, particularly in the women's game, is where I really feel I can add some value and and change the game and have more Lauren Bell experiences, but from the safety of behind international cricket, and then getting ready to do that. So um, but she was just a pleasure to work with, and she's obviously flying now, she's got the benefit of it.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:13

That's good. Well, let's go to to so we mentioned Izzy One. What was different about Izzy's action and and how she went about her fast bowling?

SPEAKER_03 1:05:23

I don't know if you'd agree with this. I think Izzy probably adopts some of the more male characteristics, but with a bit of rotation still in there. So she will run in fast, she'll she'll get herself side on, she'll block that front leg out, she'll hinge over it, but she still uses a subtle change of direction to get herself into that rotational position. So she probably does hit some of the matrix parameters. Um just does it slightly differently because she still has that element of rotation at the end, so which might be the limiting factor. I don't know if that's on ball speed, why she can hit a Certain speed, but doesn't seem to be able to get much.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:04

I haven't done much work with Lawrence or with Izzy, so it's a more just we'll look at videos are similar to what you're explaining. I think I'm a big believer that time, and I don't I think Shiny's has a similar philosophy when we talk of it, it kind of comes back to time, is that time's the limiting factor. Um and with Izzy, I think she does go towards more of the males and tries to get more run-up momentum in, which then limits time, and then you kind of you're on that trying to find that sweet spot again, I think, in terms of like can you get the ball out in the direction you want with the speed on it while still being able to complete your action? I think that bandwidth gets narrower and narrower the shorter time you've got, and your movement variability and your noise and everything that's in it. Um so yeah, I think it's a really difficult space for females and girls to be developing in because there's lots of research on males, and you could read a lot of stuff and go run up faster, you'll bowl faster. But we've got some great PhDs going on, which maybe point in a different way, which hopefully we'll get out shortly.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:05

Yeah. But I mean, Phelps, to give you an idea how Phelps has often helped me, he sent me an article just the other day which was so useful around rather than trying to almost fight the fact that girls use rotation, how about we work with it like some of the other athletes that work in rotational sports and almost make that their super strength? Make them so conditioned and robust in those rotational planes, if you like, that they can actually use it as a performance benefit as long as we can do the other things really well, and we put uh enough strength and support around the body so they can cope with that or even use it more effectively, that might be where we get some more performance from. But that's probably yet to be explored. Um, but it's a nice way of thinking outside the box how can we how can we challenge convention and move these girls on? And of course, we haven't talked about it because of dirty words sometimes. This whole workload thing is also the girls work on much smaller loads than the men. Um, you know, to give you an idea if the male bowlers are getting through 40 overs a week, on average our girls are on 15 and they might get to 20 at some point, and it's so you're limited on time as well, and trying to make those changes and and um have significant impact in that time frame that you need because you just don't have the volume of balls. So that's also another challenge.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:24

Is that based on research, Mace?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:27

Yeah, I think a lot of it would be, I suppose, Shawnee. I mean, it's always one of those up for debate type thing. I I think it's again it's individual. So Lauren Bell would sit on the highest end of that because she's very robust and she does bowl more and tolerates more. Some of a and you've got to remember the girls come into this space quite young, you know, 17, 18 years of age. You know, we've got young Pika Gore at six foot three, and she's only just turned 20 and long body, long levers, and trying to bowl fast. You can imagine why you have these quite tight bandwidths, if you like, of of load. Um, it can be frustrating because you know you need time on task. Um we do need to work out a way, I think, of getting the girls more robust so they can do more work. That definitely has to be in our forward planning somehow.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:17

Mates, what what's your take on um? So obviously we talk about workloads, yeah. Some people think it's a dirty word. It's it's uh yeah, it's something we have to be aware of, isn't it, as fast bowling coaches, especially if you're working up and down a scale. And by scale I mean young to old. Um, you know, a lot of overs and not a lot of overs. Do you do you as a coach sometimes sort of move outside of the workloads if you think there's enough of a reward you can get from it?

SPEAKER_03 1:09:48

I'm certainly prepared to. Um, but it's like anything, I don't think any given day of bowling is going to necessarily cause you any problems unless you're at least fatiguing in front of your eyes because you're getting up to 15 others or something crazy. But I'm certainly prepared to move outside of them in a short space of time if I think a session or a week's worth of work is gonna really benefit. We just need to do more because you can always adjust for that a little bit later on. Um, there's nothing more frustrating than getting five or six overs in, and you just cracked it, and then you've got to put the ball down, mighty. Yeah, you really want to you just want to let's let's bank some of that great work, let's get another two or three overs out, and I think that's okay. Um it might have to be an individual thing again, but generally speaking, workloads are a guide at the end of the day. I don't think they're an absolute. Um there's got to be some common sense and flexibility around it as no as long as you think about what comes after. I think that's the key bit.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:46

Yeah. That makes complete sense. So with with regards to to women's bowling moving forward now, where do you think your biggest bang for your buck is for performance?

SPEAKER_03 1:11:00

I again I'll probably get shot at by a million people tomorrow when I walk in here. I'm still really keen to explore Hey, I'm gonna see I want to see us change the game. I was at the Ashes Test when we picked Laurenfire out of the Cali Cricket, and she turned up on that day, she came thundering in, and she had batters hopping around, the crowd was up and about. Um, and it was really like watching a proper test match, and it was fantastic, and I got really excited and I thought, and I look at the athletes I'm working with now. There's um a couple, Phoebe Turner from Durham, uh Cass McCarthy from the Blaze. These girls are proper athletes who can bowl quick balls, and it's really exciting. And we've got to be okay with exploring it because again, like I said, still got coach skill, but where the game's gonna really change and become entertaining, I think, is the speed of it. And that means the girl team the ball further now, they're far better in the field, they're throwing it further, they're doing everything quicker. The only thing lagging behind, I think, is more fast bowlers. Um and I think it's just being brave enough to explore that and be prepared to take an element of risk, build really good athletes, do it smartly, understand how they do it, and let's give it a run. Let's see if we can unpick a few. So, my vision for the next three or four years might be that rather than spin dominating the game at all levels, you know, all ends of the match, actually follow the men's game a little bit in terms of we've got two absolute out and out quicks bowling from either end with the new ball, a quick going through the middle, bowling short, some great spinners around them, and some quicks to close out the game at the other end because they're bowling fast yorkers straight and wide with good variations, just want the game to catch up. And I think it can, especially with the young group we've got coming through now, and the information we're slowly gathering and the understanding that they do do things differently. So let's work with it, and um I think we can do it.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:58

So, your your role at the moment is so if that's your vision, you're sort of profiling against that with all the all the talent that's coming through.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:07

Yeah, I am, and I I totally understand that because I was one, not everyone's gonna bowl fast. But there's and there are also room for some very skillful bowlers out there that I don't doubt that. But I still think some of them you look at them and you go, There's a bit more in there. Yeah, let's be let's be brave enough to try and find it in the safest way possible, obviously, and at the right time. But yeah, I think um talent from a talent ID point of view, it's probably looking a little bit more broadly because of they're all at such a different range of ages. I haven't got this massive talent pool of fast bowlers, so it's looking at quite a variety of of types. So I've been in the tent, lucky enough to be in the tent here in Loughborough today, and you've got the England Lions men's bowlers in, and they're all absolute behemoths, they're all like six foot five plus massive lads, all thundering in by the speed of light. And there's lots of them, it seems. And we've got a really small group, and only a couple of those will probably reach 70 plus mile an hour. So I want to expand that group. Um, so that means looking at a pretty small pool, so I have to extend it down and look at what's coming, even at the ages of 15, 16. Have we got any potential down there that we might need to nurse for the next so many years? Um it's a big job, mate, but I'm one I'm excited about.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:35

Yeah, it's exciting, isn't it? Because women's cricket is is really on a massive upward curve, isn't it? And as you say, this is what what we're all about at Science and Shiny. We want to see fast bowlers coming through.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:53

Yeah, the stuff around her, and it's her first real crack at that, and the excitement that comes with having a watching a fast bowler thunder in and do their thing. It's I think it's fantastic. So yeah, specific roles, fast bowling coach. I want to see more Lauren Bells running around and Lauren Filers.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:10

Yeah, it's it's it's great, Mason. It's really exciting, not not only to see the journey that you've gone on, but now where you've you know you you you're an international fast bowling coach, and you've actually said, you know what, what I want to do, because you've you've been there now and you know what they're after, so you're now in a great position and very well set with obviously the the education you've gone through. I mean education, yes, a little bit of formal stuff through your level four. You were you were a Lordie level level four. Yeah, level four. Yeah, we've got twelve. So we need to be grateful to Lordie Four, haven't we? And um, you know, now on your your education with regards to you've worked through all aspects of the game, and now you're sort of custodian of of England's fast bowling hopes for the future. Sorry, mate, not too much pressure, but uh you can definitely take that. Lads, have you got any more questions? We've we've had Mace now for well over an hour and it's been brilliant. We could just go on chat in about any any questions.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:10

Did you actually miss bowling or are you happy now coaching him, watching it?

SPEAKER_03 1:16:15

No, I I don't know. I Shani did say, didn't he, at the very start, that if Mace was to look at his bowling action now and and have a have a look at him, what would he do? The list is so long that I've tried to park bowling forever. I'm trying to try and forget that I ever did it. The one the one story that the girls quite like about my cricket, it's not a it's not a bowling story, it's a batting story. It was T20 is a pinch hitter in 2003 and got a ten-ball duck. That that gets a little bit of traction. They got the Robin Hood one now, aren't they?

SPEAKER_05 1:16:56

Brilliant.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:01

It was an article highlighting my ten ball naught at Bristol versus Gloucester. Thanks, that's what we're in for for the next few years, is it? Brilliant. Brilliant.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:13

May this be great to chat to you. Thanks for coming on onto the podcast, and hopefully, we can have you on again soon. You can talk us through the progress. Yeah, that'd be great.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:23

And thanks, great to see you guys and loved it. So, yeah, thanks. Thanks very much, opportunity. Thanks, see you later. Cheers, mate.