Buderim’s David Saker is an international cricket coach who has held senior roles with Australia, England and Sri Lanka. He is the current Melbourne Renegades coach and has been enjoying some “grass roots” mentoring with Caloundra. In this column for Sunshine Coast News, he has some strong advice for the local association and clubs …
That Ashley Noffke is the only national player to come from the region over several decades is a sad indictment on Sunshine Coast cricket.
It’s simply not good enough for such a great sporting area.
To produce just one top player, we’re clearly not doing the right thing by our talent.
We should be looking after the younger players and producing Queensland cricketers.
Unfortunately, for whatever reason, whether it’s our coaching, our facilities, or our competition, we just don’t do it.
I’m obviously going to ruffle some feathers, but I don’t care, we just need make sure the players on the Sunshine Coast are getting the best chances and, at the moment, they’re not.
Better communication
In my time working at Caloundra, it’s become clear the cricket pathways don’t work well on the Sunshine Coast.
There’s not a lot of communication between the clubs in the local competition and the Sunshine Coast Scorchers in the Queensland competition.
The number one job for local clubs should be to produce Scorchers players.
It’s then the Scorchers’ job to produce Queensland Bulls players and Queensland’s job to produce Australian players.
But I’m not sure all the clubs on the Coast want their players to go to the Scorchers.
I think it’s political and a lot of people have got their own agendas, and it shouldn’t be like that.
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I’ve coached young guys (juniors) who are good enough to play very good cricket.
But when they go to clubland, what’s the messaging from those clubs to progress them to state premier cricket?
I’m worried that once they get to 17 and 18, they’re not getting the best advice.
They’re not getting pushed to play for the Scorchers.
So, we’re going to lose them.
A lot of 18-year-olds are lost to the game anyway because there’ are a lot of other competing interests, but if we had more of a pathway to the Scorchers and to Queensland cricket, then they might stay hungrier and stay in the game.
Local clubs should be supporting the regional body as much as possible.
In turn, the Scorchers should give local clubs clarity on how, and why, they pick club players and where they will play them. Are they batting them at six? Are they bowling them?
If they give local clubs good reasons, then I’m as happy as you could be, because that’s where we should want our players playing.
We need to make sure the players are getting the best outcome, not the coaches or the clubs.
Sometimes we get it the other way around and look after ourselves first and then look after the players.
As the coach of Caloundra, I’d rather see three of my players go on to play for the Scorchers than to win a premiership.
I think people need to put egos aside and start thinking about the players rather than their own interests.
Working both ways
The Scorchers have also got to make sure their players go back to local clubs when they’re available.
We were happy and lucky enough to get Harry Clarke-Burnham back from the Scorchers for a recent game, but from all reports there were quite a few Scorchers players who didn’t go back to their clubs.
If they don’t go back and play, they should be penalised in some way because we (local clubs) produce the players for the Scorchers, and then they should repay us with players coming back to local clubs when there is an opportunity.
They’re not first-class cricketers or Test players who need a rest, they need as much as cricket as possible.
Coaching queries
There is quite a bit of talent on the Sunshine Coast, but I’m worried about the coaching, from what I’ve seen.
Are there any other bowling coaches in the region, other than myself?
There’s a lot of batting coaches, one being Rod Davison. He’s a very good coach, who has only been on the Coast for the past 18 months.
But again, we haven’t produced any Queensland players, so what are our batting coaches doing?
Are they coaching the way they should be coaching?
The first thing I thought of when I got to the Coast was that Ashley Noffke is the only guy this area has produced as far as senior national representation goes.
That’s a worry and if I was a coach on the Coast for a long time, I’d be concerned that we hadn’t produced more.
Schedule dramas
There’s a couple of things that happened during recently that did not make any sense.
The Scorchers Under-19s team had a game on the same day the local clubs played in T20 finals.
The Scorchers Under-19s only play about five games a year. Surely, the Sunshine Coast Cricket Association can make sure their club games aren’t on the same time as the Scorchers Under-19s games.
It’s ridiculous that a club can’t play some of their best players because they’re playing Under-19s.
Of course, we want them to play for the Scorchers, but if the scheduling was done at the start of the season, it should be easily rectified by not playing club games at the same time as the Scorchers.
It’s the simplest thing they could do, but two Sunday games have clashed with Scorchers Under-19 games and that does my head in.
Learn and adapt
Rugby league on the Sunshine Coast is a great example of players moving up and down the tiers.
Why wouldn’t the Sunshine Coast Cricket Association go to the Sunshine Coast Rugby League for advice?
From all reports, the Falcons did have teething problems at the start of their relationships with local clubs, so the SCCA can ask them: ‘how did you work it all out?’
The great thing about the Falcons is that when guys play well for them, they get recognised and go on to the Storm.
And if they’re not going well for the Falcons and get dropped, or if they have to make way for Storm players who are coming back, then they just go back to play for local clubs.
It makes sense and that’s how it should work.
