Mickey Arthur will serve as a consultant, and Morne Morkel will serve as Pakistan’s bowling coach
Former South Africa internationals Morne Morkel and Andrew Puttick are expected to be hired by the PCB to serve as the bowling and batting coaches for the Pakistan men’s side, respectively. Also, the board approved Mickey Arthur’s hiring as a consultant in addition to his continued employment as Derbyshire’s head coach.
The coaching group is set up so that Arthur can function remotely as the team director. He was also given the task of assembling the coaching panel, which is made up of everyone who works abroad.
Grant Bradburn, a former fielding coach for Pakistan, will serve as the head coach, and Cliffe Deacon and Drikus Saaiman will keep their positions as physiotherapist and strength and conditioning coach, respectively.
After his IPL commitment as bowling coach at Lucknow SuperGiants, Morkel will formally join the team. He formerly served on the Namibia coaching staff for the Australia 2022 T20 World Cup, and he is currently the bowling coach for the Durban SuperGiants in the SA20 League.
During the T20 World Cup in South Africa, he also spent some time serving for the New Zealand women’s team.
Next month, 42-year-old Puttick will join the Pakistani team. Since then, he has worked as a batting consultant within South Africa. His only international appearance was for South Africa in 2005. In the most recent T20 World Cup, he served as the batting coach for the South Africa women’s side.
He worked with the developing team and served as assistant coach for South Africa A’s 2019 tour of India. He played for Western Province and Cape Cobras during his domestic career, scoring more than 18000 runs.
Bradburn, a former all-rounder for New Zealand, served in the Pakistani system for more than three years before leaving in 2021.
Before taking on the new position at the HPC, he previously served as the fielding coach for the men’s national team since September 2018. He left his position 18 months before his contract expired in May 2020, during Ramiz Raja’s time as board chairman of the National Academy.
In a selective manner with the PCB, Arthur will work remotely as the full-time coaching staff will be present. He will travel to Lahore in the upcoming month and return before the ODI World Cup to participate in a training camp.
He won’t be going to Sri Lanka or any other bilateral series with the Pakistani side. His full-time commitment with Derbyshire in England, a position he does not want to leave, will be fulfilled.
Due to the retirement of Saqlain Mushtaq’s and Shaun Tait‘s contracts, Pakistan was left without a full-time coaching staff. Since then, Pakistan has only participated in one T20I series, which they lost 2-1 to Afghanistan under interim leadership. Starting on April 14, Pakistan will host New Zealand for five T20Is and five ODIs.