Shane Watson Suggests Trevor Bayliss' Name For Australia's Head Coach

Cricket Image for Shane Watson Suggests Trevor Bayliss' Name For Australia's Head Coach (Image Source: Google)

Former Australia all-rounder Shane Watson feels that Trevor Bayliss could be someone Cricket Australia (CA) must look for as the head coach of the mens side. After the departure of Justin Langer as the head coach, Andrew McDonald is currently the interim coach of the men's side.

Though Watson expects McDonald to be in the new coaching setup, the international coaching experience of Bayliss is hard to ignore. Bayliss was the head coach of Sri Lanka from 2007-11 before taking up a stint with England from 2015-19, where he guided them to winning the Men's Cricket World Cup at home.

"I love the experience Trevor Bayliss has. He has probably seen every single thing possible in cricket just about and I would love to see him get a great opportunity. Andrew McDonald is a great coach and is in the early part of his career, but I would err towards experience just for this interim period for the next stage of Australian cricket," said Watson on the latest episode of The ICC Review show.

Watson heaped praise on Langer's stint as the head coach from taking Australia out of the post-Sandpaper Gate scandal in 2018 to winning the Men's T20 World Cup in the UAE and a 4-0 victory in the Ashes at home.

"He (Langer) did a tremendous job to know the success he had as a coach to be able to be a part of a team and the resurrection of them winning the T20 World Cup for the first time. There have been a lot of tries beforehand and the team wasn't able to get across the line and to be able to win the most recent Ashes series 4-0 here at home is an incredible achievement as a coach."

"He did a brilliant job at a time when Australian cricket really needed someone to come in and pull back everyone around the team at that time too and instill the fabric of the baggy green is exactly what Justin Langer did incredibly well."

Watson, 40, felt that the Australia head coach position could be broken up into red-ball and white-ball stints in the future.

"I think it is going to have to be a necessity to break up the formats with their (Australia's) coaches. I think there is a good chance they will split the roles as I don't think it is sustainable that everyone does every single format for a long period of time."

"There is always going to be burnout and fatigue in a team environment, especially now with Covid and bubbles and similar situations that are around. The sooner that Cricket Australia breaks up the formats with the coaches I think everyone will benefit from it."