CA chief defends short-term offer to Langer: ‘Transition in best interests of team for unity and future success’

Cricket Australia chief Nick Hockley has defended the controversial decision to offer Justin Langer a short-term contract extension which led to the coach resigning from the position on Saturday.

Hockley fronted the media a day after the CA board met and decided to offer Langer a deal to extend his tenure beyond June until the end of the year when Australia will host the Twenty20 World Cup, defending the title won in November in the UAE.

Langer was furious that his request for another four years in the role fell on deaf ears and while thanking him for his service and saying CA would be eternally grateful for the 51-year-old West Australian’s contribution, Hockley said the move towards a new voice in the dressing room was the right one.

“The decision to start a process of transition is what we believe is in the best interest of the men’s team for unity and future success,” he said, confirming that Langer would not have been offered a further deal if he had taken up the six-month offer.

“We held discussions last night about extending Justin’s contract to take in the T20 World Cup in Australia later this year. We are disappointed that Justin decided not to accept this extension and instead resigned, effective immediately, but we understand and respect his decision.

“We were pretty clear with Justin that it [the extension] was for a period of transition. We want to be clear and respectful to him. He’s done a fantastic job, made a significant shift, but when we sat down and looked at the needs of the team going forward, we felt the team has evolved, the requirements of the head coach had evolved so we were very, very clear that we were looking at a short-term extension.

“These decisions are never easy and I understand given how admired and respected Justin is as an absolute legend of the game that many people will be disappointed by the decision to only offer Justin a short-term contract.”

Hockley said Langer had been an “outstanding coach over the past four years”, pointing to his success in retaining the Ashes in the UK in 2019, the unexpected T20 World Cup triumph and the recent 4-0 home series triumph over England.

“His impact has been fundamental to restoring trust and respect in the team,” Hockley said in a clear reference to the 2018 ball-tampering scandal in Cape Town under the previous regime headed by Darren Lehmann.

“His passion, dedication and commitment is second to none.”

Hockley conceded there were “robust” meetings over the past year after players had voiced their unhappiness with Langer’s coaching methods which led to “role clarity” heading into the T20 World Cup and the home Ashes series.

“We did have some challenging conversations and some issues. I think credit to absolutely everybody throughout the national teams set-up for having some really robust and direct conversations and creating that real project focus and clarity as to roles and responsibilities.

“What we’ve seen is specialist, bowling, batting, fielding coaches really step up and own their departments. It [the head coach role] is very much that more overseeing, strategic role.

“The level of interest, of public scrutiny, it’s been difficult for everyone but we felt it was really important to do a thorough process and we felt it was really important to do that post the Ashes so there were no distractions for that really, really important series,” he said when asked if, in hindsight, CA would do things differently.

“Let’s not forget where we were when Justin started. He brought so much to the set-up, he’s brought a real level of discipline, commitment. He’s brought incredible values to the group, and what we see now is across the whole group, including the players, the senior leaders, we’ve got a fantastic new Test captain in Pat Cummins, we’re seeing everybody step up. The role going forward and the evolution is everybody stepping up, owning their space and taking accountability.

“Something we’ll consider going forward is who takes a leading role on particular campaigns or particular series. That’s something we’ve been talking about. But certainly we think it’s really important to have an overarching head coach.

“We think it’s really important to have a level of continuity and connection between the different formats.”

Hockley confirmed senior assistant Andrew McDonald would take over as caretaker coach until a full-time appointment was made.

Trevor Bayliss, Jason Gillespie, Michael Di Venuto are also potential candidates to replace Langer but it is unlikely anyone will publicly voice their desire for the role in the near future.

“The current plan is to look to appoint a permanent successor to Justin,” Hockley said when asked about the hectic schedule over the next 12 months which includes tours to Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India, as well as home series against South Africa and the West Indies plus hosting the T20 World Cup in October and November.

“But we will continue to take a very project-focused approach to each of the series, because it’s worked so well this summer.”