Perceptual skills are central to performance in many different domains, for example everyday activities such as reaching and grasping. It is now accepted that successful performance in sports requires skill in perception as well as the efficient and accurate execution of movements. In open skilled sports agility is a vital aspect of the game which involves change of direction speed and perceptual and decision making factors. This literature review will discuss the importance of perceptual and decision making factors (perceptual skills) of agility performance such as visual scanning and anticipation. Also this literature review will explore the development of the Reactive Agility Test (RAT), research of perceptual skills of expert and novice athletes in a variety of sports, the influence of perceptual training on sports performance and practical applications in prescribing agility training. Recent research findings reveal that perceptual training has been beneficial in enhancing performance. The benefits of perceptual training is that it isn`t time consuming, can be used to supplement physical training if an athlete is injured, and when conditions aren`t suitable for training. However perceptual training equipment isn`t widely available and creating sports specific perceptual training clips can be time consuming to produce as a training tool. Therefore another practical way to train perceptual components of agility is to use small sided conditioning games.
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