Jason Gillespie one of the leading candidates for England coach: Andrew Strauss

Andrew Strauss

Newly appointed Director of Cricket Andrew Strauss has confirmed that former Australian speedster and current Yorkshire coach Jason Gillespie is one of the frontrunners for the England coaching job after the sacking of Peter Moores on Saturday. Gillespie was in charge of the championship-winning Yorkshire side last year and has built a reputation as one of the top coaches in the game today.

Speaking to Sky Sports after the official announcement of his appointment, "He's (Gillespie) one of the candidates, absolutely. At the moment I have just been concerning myself with the process and how we go about it. Over the next few days, we'll start approaching candidates.

“I need to go and meet them, speak to them and see their philosophy on cricket, their philosophy on coaching and whether it's aligned with what I think is in the best interests of England cricket.”

In the past, England have experimented with different coaches for Test and limited-overs cricket, but Strauss made it clear that they won’t go down that route this time around and that there will only be one coach across all the three formats.

"I think there will be one over-arching coach (for Tests and one-day cricket). I think you need one person in control and in charge of that environment.”

While England will not want to dither for too long in regards to the new coach with the all-important Ashes series coming up, they wouldn’t want to make any knee-jerk decisions either with the emphasis very much being on finding the best candidate possible. Moores’ assistant, Paul Farbrace, will play the role of a caretaker for their upcoming series against New Zealand, starting on May 21.