MasterstrokeSquad building and management
Squad rotation
Resting players across a congested schedule to manage fatigue and injury, especially fast bowlers, without weakening the side too much.
Squad rotation is the practice of resting players and bringing in replacements across a season, so that fatigue and injury do not decide the campaign.
Cricket's calendar is relentless. A franchise season packs fourteen or more matches into six weeks, often with travel between them, and international players go straight from one to a tour. Fast bowlers are the main concern: bowling is a repetitive high-load action, and a seamer who plays every match at full intensity is a stress fracture waiting to happen. Batters tire more slowly but lose sharpness, and a squad full of tired players makes tired decisions in the field.
Rotation is a trade-off between today's XI and next month's. Resting a bowler for a match you expect to win keeps him fresh for one you need to; playing him through a niggle risks losing him for the season. Good managers plan it around the fixture list, use the depth they bought at the auction, and pair rotation with training loads, easing off in the nets during a heavy run of matches.
In Masterstroke: injuries are counted in days, hard training weeks drain the legs, and tired players get hurt. Manage injuries and rotation between fixtures, or the season will manage them for you.