RHODRI EVANS: The new managing director of men's cricket, who retired from all forms of cricket in 2016, outlined how he will take important decisions during his tenure at the helm.
Rob Key says that England’s off-field approach under his stewardship as the new managing director of men's cricket will "move with the times" and be done by taking "everything in its individual case".
Speaking with former England captain Nasser Hussain for a Sky Sports interview, Key responded to the question of an England coach working in the Indian Premier League (IPL) by saying that he "would much rather have the best person for 10 months of the year than someone not as good for 12".
He added: "It’s like with players. If you take Jos Buttler for example, Buttler can play the whole of the IPL but a coach could not do it? I don’t see that as an issue at the moment and who knows where we are going in five, six, seven years’ time.
"During the IPL, there’s no international cricket on during the IPL, so I don’t see it as an issue in the day and age we live in, where it would be an issue if you are a coach doing that."
Key was in conversation with Hussain, who gave him his Test debut in 2002 (Tom Shaw/Getty Images)
Key, who retired from all forms of cricket in 2016 and has since built an impressive punditry career, outlined how he will take important decisions during his tenure at the helm.
"You have got to take everything in its individual case. Someone might say, ‘how can you then call someone back, how could you call say Jofra [Archer] back from the IPL when the coach is there the whole time?’ I will tell you what, the coach is not running into bowl and potentially getting injured.
"You cannot just have blanket rules for everything, you have got to look at each individual case and think about what is the best thing for us to do here. I would much rather have the best person for ten months of the year than someone not as good for 12."
Key was pressed on many of the prospective candidates to be the next England head coach being from overseas. Gary Kirsten and Graham Ford are understood to be under consideration as interviews begin this week.
"I don’t look at everything as just black and white, I always look at the reason. If there is logic behind what someone is doing, then fine."
"As far as English coaches, this has gone on for a long time now and we have got to look at how we educate our coaches," he said.
"We make sure the same thing as well this our coaches; coaching at times, is like a player – you want to invest in the right people all the time, so you have got to earmark because there’s a lot of other things you can do, like you [Nasser] and I would have gone onto the other side of the fence [punditry].
"So we need to make coaching an attractive part of cricket. We have got to make sure that we are seeing, as they go through the system or if they are completely outside of it or if they are going through courses, then we have got to earmark people and say ‘this person is worth the investment. these are the ones we’ve got to try and make sure and keep an eye on them throughout our system because they might be in five or six years’ time, they might be the best person to do that job.’"
During his first outing in front of the media, Key confirmed that both Stuart Broad and James Anderson, who were left out of the West Indies Test series, will return against New Zealand next month.
Gary Ballance and Alastair Cook (Gareth Copley/Getty Images)
Citing the decision to swap Alastair Cook for Gary Ballance for the 2015 World Cup, Key will aim to apply common sense to all decisions.
"In my opinion, they should come back. And that is what’s happening. The good thing is that Ben Stokes agrees. I think he was prepared for an argument when we spoke about it! He was like ‘right, Jimmy and Broady are coming back’. And I just went ‘yeah, no that’s fine!’ And then we moved on.
"I don’t look at everything as just black and white, I always look at the reason. If there is logic behind what someone is doing, then fine. It’s like when England in the World Cup in 2015 dropped Alastair Cook and then brought in Gary Ballance.
"There is no part of me that can understand why you would do that, but there is part of me that can understand about Broad and Anderson. Away from home, they are getting on a bit, you want to try out some new people; OK, I can understand that. It does not mean that I would have done it."
Posted by Roger Newman on 10/05/2022 at 15:35
Sorry Rob I know you are a decent youg man but your comments in this interview just does not make sense if you are MD of Business which cricket is . Anyway for your sake I hope you don't regret the transition from the media to business
Welcome to www.thecricketer.com - the online home of the world’s oldest cricket magazine. Breaking news, interviews, opinion and cricket goodness from every corner of our beautiful sport, from village green to national arena.