ECB appoints Lead Specialist Coaches for women’s and girls’ cricket

The England and Wales Cricket Board today announced the appointment of Carl Crowe, Barry Hyam, Paul Jarvis, Ali Maiden and Cookie Patel as Lead Specialist Coaches to work across women’s and girls’ cricket.

Current England Women’s Assistant Coach Carl Crowe will lead on spin bowling whist ex Essex wicket keeper Barry Hyam and ex England pace bowler Paul Jarvis will work with players to develop wicket keeping and fast bowling respectively. The lead batting coach will be Ali Maiden who is currently the Durham Academy Assistant Coach and who graduated from the ECB Master Coach Level IV programme last year. Cookie Patel, ECB Regional Training Manger for the Midlands and Fielding Coach at Northamptonshire CCC, has been appointed Lead Fielding Coach.

The coaching structure for women’s and girls’ cricket in England and Wales has been realigned to utilise Lead Specialist Coaches across the player pathway with all the coaches working with identified high potential players from Under 15 through to England.

Each coach will commit up to 20 days per year to the women’s and girls’ programme and will work in alignment with the existing team of specialist coachesat ECB. Over the first year aparticular focus will be on working with Under 19 and England Women's Academy players.

ECB Head of England Women’s Cricket Clare Connor said: "The move to appointLead Specialist Coaches is an exciting one for the elite women's and girls' game. The calibre of applicants for the roles was outstanding and reflects the regard in which the women's game is widely held.

“I am delighted with the appointments we have made and I reallylook forward to seeing the impact they make on our current and future world class cricketers."

The five appointments made are as follows:

Lead Spin Bowling Coach – Carl Crowe

Lead Fast Bowling Coach – Paul Jarvis

Lead Batting Coach – Ali Maiden

Lead Wicket Keeping Coach – Barry Hyam

Lead Fielding Coach – Cookie Patel

Read more about the Kent women's team:

Five Kent women included in England women's squad for South Africa tour

Kent win the 2011 Women's County Championship

Kent Women: T20 County Champions 2011