‘Inside Edge’ first appeared in Mental Health Today in February2011. To subscribe to the magazine click here.
How playing sports like cricket can improve service users’mental health. Crispin Andrews reports.
Mark Fletcher wasn’t a bad plumber, but he just couldn’t keep ittogether long enough to hold down a job. Coaching cricket, he’sfound, is a different matter.
In 2001, the then 25-year-old was diagnosed with bipolardisorder. Withdrawing from society, he put on weight and startedsmoking too much. Some days Fletcher found it difficult to get outof bed, let alone the house. If he hadn’t discovered cricket, hemight still be living the same insular life, rather than workingfor Slough NHS Trust as a cricket, football and tennis coach.
Fletcher was already playing a bit of football with other mentalhealth service users when Slough NHS Trust set up a cricket group.He decided to give it a go and soon discovered that there’s more tothe game than cucumber sandwiches and a very hard ball coming veryfast at your head. “It’s really quite a social game that gives yousomething to talk about,” he says. “You’re out there mixing withpeople who have similar issues, and there’s plenty of time whenyou’re not actively involved to get to know new people.”
Relaxed fun
Famous cricketers like Marcus Trescothick and Australia’s ShaunTait have publicly struggled with mental health issues in recentyears. More recently, England’s Michael Yardy returned home earlyfrom the World Cup suffering from depression. But that’s thehighly-pressurised world of international cricket, where touringschedules mean a player is away from home and family for months ata time.
As a recreational game, played for fun, cricket is different.Annie Ellison, the physical wellbeing officer who organised theSlough cricket course, explains how cricket can have a relaxed,family feel to it. “Almost anyone can get involved, as a player,scorer, umpire or just a spectator. You get a lovely chilledatmosphere in peaceful surroundings.”
Service users get a mixture of matches and net practice atSlough Cricket Club. “For people who don’t usually venture outsidetheir own neighbourhood the cricket club’s like a green oasis,”Ellison says.
Fletcher too, thrived in his new surroundings. He showed naturalleadership qualities and could play a bit, so Ellison encouragedhim to take his coaching award and now employs him as a coach todeliver cricket, tennis and football to other mental health serviceusers. It’s the first long-term job he’s had in 10 years.
“He’s self-employed, is out of debt, found himself a girlfriend,given up smoking and lost four stone.” Ellison says. “He’s so muchhappier and more confident.”
Slower pace
Football, rugby, netball – any invasion game where teams attackand defend goals or targets – demands non-stop action fromparticipants. Cricket is different. It can be played at a slowerpace by people who aren’t fit enough to keep going for longperiods.
“There are lots of ways to get your body moving, swinging thebat, running between wickets, and bowling,” says coach RickyLashley, who runs the Slough programme. “But there’s plenty of timeto rest too. If you want, cricket can be quite a sedate game.”
But there was nothing sedate about the tournament that Fletcherand his new friends went to last year, though. It was at Lord’s,the home of cricket, and for the Slough cricketers and teams ofservice users from Birmingham, Barnsley, Maidenhead and Aylesbury,it was sheer excitement.
Ellison secured funding from Time to Change, the UK-widecampaign to change attitudes towards mental health, for it. TheLord’s indoor cricket centre even relaxed their all-white rules asthe teams played eight-a-side eight-over games batting in pairs,using Kwik cricket rules – a small-sided version of the game usingan incrediball, a soft rubber ball with a seam.
“Playing at Lord’s is the ultimate for any cricketer,” Ellisonsays. “A real special experience, gave the participants somethingto look forward to.”
Steve Bell, an occupational therapist with Buckinghamshire EarlyIntervention Service, saw his team of Aylesbury youngsters get intoa sport they hadn’t played since school. “It was great for theirconfidence when they realised they were still good at it,” hesaid.
The game of cricket, as well as its environment, is therapeuticfor people with mental health issues. “There’s so much for peopleto think about. They haven’t got time to focus on their problems,”Bell added.
Life lessons through cricket
Although part of a team, players have to rely on themselves inone-on-one contests between bat and ball, blot out externaldistractions and concentrate on what they want to achieve. Playerslearn to work towards short-term individual targets: hit the ballaway from fielders, stop the ball, bowl the batsman out. With teammates, they also work towards longer-term targets – win the game,stop the opposition batters scoring.
Richard Doughty, a former county cricketer turned mentor, wholike Trescothick and Yardy suffered from mental health issuesduring his playing career, uses cricket’s example to teach at-riskyoung people about time-keeping, co-operation, preparation andpresentation.
“Cricket shows people how to build for their futures, how towork hard now to achieve later,” he says. “A cricketer scores ahundred gradually – with lots of little successes contributing totheir overall success; so too does a player work hard over a numberof years to reach the top and stay there. With so much instantly tohand, concepts like these can be difficult to understand andapply.”
Mark Fletcher has found cricket to be the sort of sport wheresuccess and improvement is easy to quantify and acknowledge.”Playing your first cover drive or getting the ball to swing whenyou’re bowling is such a confidence booster, it brings a big smileto people’s faces,” he says.
Post uploaded October 2011. By Crispin Andrews
