Cricket injuries
Hamstring injuries in cricket
The most common injury in the game, and the one most likely to happen twice. The second one is usually a rehabilitation problem rather than bad luck.
Before you read on
This is general information about a cricket injury, not a diagnosis of yours. Two bowlers with the same symptom often have different problems. If your back, shoulder or leg is hurting, get assessed by someone who is able to examine you.
Why cricket, and why now
Hamstrings fail during high-speed running, and cricket delivers high-speed running in the least controlled way of any sport. You do not warm into a sprint between wickets. You stand at the crease, then sprint maximally because someone called for a third run, having done almost nothing for forty minutes. Fielders do the same chasing a ball to the rope. Bowlers accumulate it across a spell.
Add a long day, a hot afternoon, and a player whose recent training has involved little genuine sprinting, and the setup is complete.
The underlying issue in most cases is that exposure to high-speed running has been low relative to the demand. Players who sprint regularly in training tolerate sprinting in matches. Players who only sprint in matches are the ones who tear.
Where it hurts matters
Two broad presentations behave differently.
- In the muscle belly, usually during a sprint, with a clear moment. Often recovers in a reasonably predictable way.
- Up near the tendon at the top, close to where the muscle attaches to the pelvis. Frequently takes longer and is less forgiving of an early return.
That is one reason the assessment matters. The two look similar to a player and behave differently over the following months.
What rehabilitation has to include
Pain settles early. Capacity does not. Returning in that gap is how the second injury happens.
- Early loading. Getting the muscle working sooner rather than waiting for it to feel normal. Protective, not aggressive.
- Strength at long muscle length. The hamstring fails while lengthening under load, so it has to be trained there. Exercises that only load it short leave the gap open.
- High-speed running, built deliberately. The part most often skipped. If you have not sprinted at close to full speed before returning, you have not tested the thing that injured you.
- Repeated efforts under fatigue. Cricket does not ask for one sprint. It asks for a sprint in the thirty-eighth over of a hot day.
- Objective criteria before returning. Strength measured rather than estimated, and running volume achieved rather than intended.
The test that matters
Before you return, you should have sprinted at close to maximum, more than once, on more than one day, without symptoms afterwards. If that has not happened, the return is a hope rather than a decision. This is the core of a Return to Performance Assessment.
Preventing the next one
Two things carry most of the weight, and neither is exciting. Keep doing hamstring strength work at long muscle length after you return, rather than stopping the week you are cleared. And keep genuine high-speed running in the program through the season, not only in pre-season.
Squads that do both have fewer hamstring injuries. Squads that do neither have a recurring problem they tend to attribute to bad luck.
Common questions
How long until I play again?
It depends on which part is injured and how badly. A mild strain in the muscle belly is often a few weeks. An injury close to the tendon at the top takes considerably longer. The honest answer at assessment is a range, narrowed as you hit milestones.
Why do hamstrings keep happening to the same players?
Usually because the first one was rehabilitated to comfort rather than to capacity. Strength at long muscle length and high-speed running tolerance both return later than pain does, and returning in that window is the classic setup for the next one.
Is stretching the answer?
No. Strength through range and exposure to high-speed running do most of the work. Stretching a recently injured hamstring hard tends to irritate it.
Do I need a scan?
Often not for a straightforward strain. Imaging is more useful when the injury is near the tendon, when it is severe, or when the timeline matters enough that grading changes the decision.
Further reading
- Askling CM, Tengvar M, Thorstensson A. Acute hamstring injuries in Swedish elite football: a prospective randomised controlled clinical trial comparing two rehabilitation protocols. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 2013.
- Orchard JW, et al. Injury surveillance reports, Cricket Australia, published annually.
Hamstring that keeps coming back?
The second one is usually fixable by fixing the rehabilitation, not the hamstring.
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