I know it’s not cricket golf to talk about golf cricket in a golf hypnosis article, even if cricket and golf hypnosis are in essence the same thing. I’m also aware that many of my readers will have no idea what cricket is all about anyway. However, this story has as much to say about sports psychology and golf hypnotism as it does about cricket. In addition, it shouldn’t be as long-winded as some cricketing stories as I’m talking about a quick form of cricket called the Twenty20 World Cup. Now when I say “quick”, I should explain that Twenty20 games take a few hours to play and that’s a lot quicker than the 5 days that constitute a Test Match such as the one starting on 8 July between England and Australia.

Back on 28 May, my friend and mentor Adam Eason wrote on his blog about how the Pakistani cricket team’s new team psychologist Maqbool “Max” Babri was hypnotising the team to win the Twenty20 World Cup. This was big news in Pakistan as cricket is their national sport and a source of great national pride. Now I’ll leave Adam’s post to explain the intricacies of Max’s approach while I focus on a key quote from Max.

“As a hypnotist I helped them let go of any negative past experiences and utterances of parents, and other powerful people which were in a negative light. Forgive others and self and not carry any burdens from the past or fears about the future. To remain in here and now play each ball, over, inning and match as if this was the only match that there is. Doing whatever can be done in here and now. ”

Now those of you who follow cricket will already know that after a shaky start, Pakistan went on to win the Twenty20 World Cup and I was delighted to read a report over the weekend about former Pakistan captain Shoaib Malik attributing the team’s success to the power of hypnotism helping the players overcome their negative frame of mind and focus only on their target. He also praised Younis Khan for his skills and leadership as captain.

Looking more closely at the specific messages, I wasn’t surprised to see how closely they align with aspects of good golf psychology advice:

So if hypnosis is good enough for the Pakistan Cricket team, just think what you can achieve with it in your golf.