[News] Hot Favourite
rsci
Scyld Berry on a man with many strings to his bow who is the new
favourite to take over as coach
DUNCAN Fletcher, a Zimbabwean with no Test experience, has emerged
as the hot favourite to become the new England cricket coach.
In a surprise move, England are poised to turn to the man who coached
Glamorgan to the 1997 County Championship to lead them into a new era
following the humiliating failure of being knocked out of the World Cup
before the Super Six phase. And, contrary to outgoing coach David Lloyd's
wishes, they are going to appoint a foreigner.
Tomorrow a short-list of candidates to succeed Lloyd will be discussed by a
working party set up by the England management advisory committee. Five
names are on the list, names which make it apparent the ECB have realised
that the cure for English cricket is not to be found entirely within our
domestic game:
Bob Woolmer, South Africa's coach until the end of the World Cup, who
played 19 Tests for England but might be described as a citizen of the world.
John Wright, the former New Zealand opening batsman who played for
Derbyshire and coaches Kent.
Dav Whatmore, who played seven Tests for Australia before coaching
Sri Lanka to the last World Cup, and now coaches Lancashire.
Jack Birkenshaw, who played five Tests for England when playing for
Leicestershire, a county he has since coached twice to the championship.
Duncan Fletcher, the former captain of Zimbabwe and now Glamorgan's
coach.
Woolmer was the early favourite, the big name sought by Lord MacLaurin
and Tim Lamb, chairman and chief executive of the ECB respectively, who
sent international teams director Simon Pack to South Africa in April to
sound him out. But Woolmer has since fallen back with every statement that
has stressed his need for a rest after the World Cup and his ambivalence
towards the job.
The difficulties involved in finding a stand-in until after England's winter tour
of South Africa have also told against Woolmer, who is now likely to
combine a return to Warwickshire with heading an academy in South Africa.
As it is, England have had to fill the vacuum created by Lloyd's departure by
asking David Graveney to continue in the same managerial position that he
occupied during the World Cup, with the help of specialist coaches as and
when required during the series against New Zealand.
The way is therefore open to the surprising choice of Fletcher - not a big
name at all, but one who could have a big and beneficial impact on English
cricket. He is the same age as Woolmer, 51, but whereas Woolmer has
tired of the international road, Fletcher is ready to embark upon it as the
culminating challenge of his career.
Fletcher does not pretend to have a magic wand to wave. What he does
have is considerable presence and natural authority, and a far quieter, lower,
profile than his more voluble predecessor. He works very closely with his
captain to achieve best practices, and tells players what they need to know,
not what they want to hear. Robert Croft once crossed swords with him,
and emerged loud in his praise.
Fletcher's coaching is not based on any academic theory but has been
developed pragmatically as he played for Zimbabwe in pre-Test years, then
coached the University of Cape Town, Western Province and Glamorgan.
His priority is to achieve the right spirit: "Most games are won in the
dressing-room" he believes. "You have to have people who enjoy each
other's company and success, it's all about creating an atmosphere." But
there is much more to him than that - and so much more is needed by
England if they are ever to maximise their resources.
Fletcher's other strengths are his ability to draw the best out of his players
(Glamorgan's season has been marked by one career-best performance
after another from inexperienced players); his insistence on discipline and
hard work, yet also on the need to rest and have some other interest in life
apart from cricket; and his perceptive analysis of technique, and not only that
of his players. According to Steve James, Glamorgan's temporary captain:
"He's brilliant at detecting the weaknesses in opponents."
It is an idle hypothesis to say that England would have done better in this
World Cup if Fletcher had been in charge. Nevertheless, England's brittle
ordinariness began with their top-order batting, and more might have been
done than was done to remedy Nick Knight's method of playing with his
hands a mile from his body, and Alec Stewart's footwork, and the captain's
burnt-out batteries.
Fletcher might even have been able to get inside Graeme Hick's head and
cure the tentativeness which still inhibits the maker of a hundred first-class
hundreds when the pressure is greatest. He was, after all, not only Hick's
captain when Zimbabwe played in the 1983 World Cup, but born and
brought up on a farm just down the road from the Trelawney Estate where
Hick first learned his batting.
It was by force of family circumstance that Fletcher became a student of the
game. Sporting talent was showered on his four brothers and on his sister
Ann, who captained Zimbabwe to the hockey gold medal at the Moscow
Olympics. Duncan had to work that much harder to keep up as they played
cricket with a tennis ball on their huge lawn, playing one-hand, one-bounce
to develop fielding skills. He came to be rated the second-best fielder
Zimbabwe produced after Colin Bland, and even now enjoys simply playing
with a ball.
As a left-handed batsman and right-arm seamer, Fletcher's playing
experience covered quite a wide spectrum, if only in southern Africa. If it is
far more dogged resistance which England want from their batsmen, as they
do, Fletcher scored 49 not out to save his second game for Rhodesia with a
finger which had been broken in his first innings.
As for discipline, he insists everyone at Glamorgan must wear the same
clothing off the field, bans the use of mobile telephones during play and
meticulously records the #10 fine levied for each offence. Before the start of
this season Glamorgan's players were told when net-practices would be held
on non-match days so they could arrange their social life accordingly. But a
player is exempted if he needs to rest.
It may be wondered if a foreign coach can identify closely enough with the
England team. But Lloyd in his enthusiasm identified too closely, as did
Graham Gooch last winter, and some calm detachment would not go amiss.
Besides, Fletcher has crossed borders before, when he emigrated to South
Africa in 1988 as his children had gone to university there and he feared the
border might close. He was working in data-processing in Cape Town when
the university approached him to be a coach part-time, which he did until he
became Western Province's director of cricket in 1993.
Fletcher has managerial skills, too, which should not be wasted by England.
Apart from organising Cape Town's league cricket, he likes to arrange
sponsors and all the hotels and air-flights for the Western Province team to
make sure of his players' welfare: he gave up as coach of South Africa's A
team when he thought they were being treated unfairly. Some of the
employees which the ECB keeps adding to its staff would become
superfluous if Duncan Fletcher takes over the England team, gets rid of the
excessive number of crutches they have to lean on and ends the long-running
cycle of under-achievement.
Thanks :: The Electronic Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk