DIFFERENCES IN SEXES

Q You were a health and physical education teacher for 24 years, North Queensland representative player and later served as Director of Coaching at Mackay and Whitsunday Cricket before joining Queensland Cricket as a Talent Officer. How do you go these days coaching elite girls cricket?

A The women are far more into detail. They want to know the why more than you would when you coach men. If they understand the why, they are in to what you are saying. The women are very coachable and willing to adapt and change a little bit quicker than the blokes are, if you explain the reasons why you are doing something. It is a full-on system these days, weights, recovery, and everything that goes along with it. You have to be professional as you can be during the WBBL because a little niggle can become a major injury and you can’t have that when you need to play two days later.

Q The team played in Mackay last season and now up to Cairns. It must be exciting to help grow the game in different areas?

A Very much so. Our biggest crowds were in Mackay last season, the girls love it as you get a great atmosphere at these games. At Mackay they had junior female teams playing a tournament around our game as well. It is a great opportunity to showcase the women’s game at the highest level. The pros getting to mix with the juniors is great and a nice blend of the juniors building their dreams. The mixture of the pros watching the juniors and vice versa works well. We played in Geelong the other day and we finished the game in quite heavy rain, we are used to playing through the weather. We just needed to get on with it.