Cricket Australia chairman ‘open to advice’ on split coaching role as Justin Langer’s associate exits

Cricket Australia will soon appoint a new men’s head coach and they may consider splitting the role once the preferred candidate comes in place, as per the new chairman Lachie Henderson. And, the wish of Henderson to ease the load of the new mentor is there with interim coach Andrew McDonald’s call for the role to be revised as well.

“I’m open to advice on that,” Henderson said when he was asked if Cricket Australia would consider separate coaches for red and white-ball cricket as well. I think it is a very time-consuming role for one individual and maybe a more distributed method of coaching is the way of the future.”

He continued: “They’re the sort of things that are playing out at the moment. We are going for a single head coach to be installed in the near future. How it plays out after that will depend a bit on that appointment, their availability and how that works across all forms of the game in what’s going to be a really busy 12 to 18 months. It may be that person is not available for every single tour around the world over the next 18 months.”

McDonald, who was the senior assistant coach to Langer and is also a favourite in the race stated that he wants clarity from Cricket Australia about how the role will look in future.

“There’s so many opinions out there and I don’t know what the best formula is because I think we haven’t probably experimented enough around that; it’s always been one coach,” McDonald told the Herald and The Age recently.

 “There hasn’t been a split role. There’s nothing to go off. I think the art is who can take the leap and, if they get it right, I think you’ll potentially have coaching for longer because it’s such a hectic job,” he continued. “They’re the ones who’ll be making a recommendation to the board. The board looks at the information presented to it and then will make the call based on that recommendation.”

“It’s not going to be a long and drawn-out process and obviously we’ve got an interim coach already installed,” Henderson said.

Notably, there will be a new team manager for the tour, with Gavin Dovey resigning after 11 long years from the post as well. And, it is also noteworthy that, Dovey was Justin Langer’s closest confidant during his four-year stint as coach.

While he was highly praised at Cricket Australia for his amazing work ethic and organizational skills, especially in the Covid-19 era, his relationship with Langer saw the increasing angst within the Australian squad. It became more when he earned extra authority in a high-performance role as well.

However, Dovey was a central figure in the “Homeworkgate” incident a decade ago, when four players were suspended after having a tough tour of India and for failing to complete a simple assignment. Moreover, he was also featured in the Australian team management during “Sandpapergate”, when Steve Smith and David Warner were handed over a ban for a year and Cameron Bancroft for nine months as well.

On the other hand, Cricket Australia’s head of performance Brian McFadyen will be the team manager, as he did during Australia’s successful Twenty20 World Cup campaign during October and November as well.