Australia short-staffed ahead of long home season
Australia, who have returned from England after a gruelling Ashes, are facing serious trouble back home. With the home season set to start in 11 days, coach Justin Langer is short-staffed and former cricketers have been lured by overseas leagues, leaving Cricket Australia with no options.
After former Australian wicketkeeper Brad Haddin stepped down as Australia’s assistant coach, head coach Justin Langer is now left short-staffed. As of now, only assistant batting coach Graeme Hick remains alongside Langer in a full-time role with the team.
According to a report by The Australian, Cricket Australia is planning to form a core group to coaches to assist Langer and also have plans to appoint a senior assistant coach but there are no suitable candidates on the horizon.
“It’s a fluid, moving beast. It’s about how we set up to be successful in the future. It’s not about a replacement (for Haddin) per se, it’s more a repositioning, a structural move to find someone to work with Justin and partner with him in the next phase,” Ben Oliver, the executive general manager of the national team, who is working to fill the roles told The Australian.
Former Australian players like Ricky Ponting, Simon Katich and Shane Warne who can make great coaches are earning more money working in the IPL. On the other hand, Andrew McDonald and Tom Moody have been roped in by The Hundred while former bowling coach Adam Grifith has recently accepted an IPL job alongside Katich.
It seems like the foreign domestic leagues, which were introduced to lure in players from around the globe, isn’t sparing the coaches and especially the Australians, who seem to be in abundance in every league across the face of the earth. It is quite evident from the fact that six out of eight teams in The Hundred will be coached by Australians.
Talking about Ponting, Oliver accepts the fact that the leagues do offer a lot as compared to the national coaching job. Pointing earns close to USD 1 million by only working in the IPL and commentaring in the BBL while Langer is paid the same price to do a relentless and tedious job of coaching the national team in all three formats.
“It’s one of the greatest challenges we have,” he said. “He’s a great example … these days you’ve got options and for someone like him who is an excellent coach and has credentials as a past Australian player. He’s also got three young kids, and being away from home for 11 months of the year, when you weigh it up, he’s going to do some county work and be an assistant coach in IPL so he can still be home for long periods,” Oliver said about Ponting.
CA used Ponting and Steve Waugh as mentors during recent series and indicated it may continue to use this model until a solution can be found. The strains on Langer coaching all three teams have been obvious but were eased when the senior pair were with him.
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