After the Test match at Adelaide is completed, John Bracewell will cease to be the coach of the New Zealand national cricket team. As soon as Bracewell steps down, he would be replaced by Andy Moles. As per Bracewell’s contract, his tenure ends in April. However, Bracewell and New Zealand Cricket have acceded that it would be advantageous for Moles to start during the home series against the West Indies. The tour of the West Indies starts on 11th December 2008 and initially there would be a Test match at Dunedin.
Andy Moles, who is 47 years old, was born in England. In the past, he was a first class batsman along with Warwickshire. Further, he was a coach of the Scotland and Kenyan squads. He was also the coach of the Northern Districts.
Matthew Mott was the chosen candidate by New Zealand for the position of coach. However, he desired to carry on with New South Wales and hence declined the offer. Graham Ford and Mickey Arthur, both from South Africa were also the leading contenders for the position of coach. However, both of them declared that they were not interested in pursuing the position.
Moles is of the opinion that many veteran cricketers from the New Zealand squad have retired and some of these have the inclination of playing in the ICL. So, Moles thinks that the New Zealand team would have to pass through a phase of development. While speaking to TV NZ, Moles said “ We’ve lost a lot of senior players over the last two years and it is a rebuilding phase. We’ve got to get a plan, move forward, set our goals, become No. 4 or 5 in Test cricket in a year’s time, and move on from there.”
In the ICC Test rankings, the current position of New Zealand is the No. 7 spot. However, if the team is defeated in the second Test match against Australia, then the West Indies will race ahead of New Zealand who would be pushed to the No. 8 spot. In this case, the only teams below New Zealand would be Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. This would be an extremely demoralizing beginning point for Moles.
The Chief Executive of New Zealand Cricket Justin Vaughan has immense confidence that Andy Moles is the appropriate selection for the job. He said “Andy has an outstanding coaching background. He has made a real impact at Northern Districts over the past two seasons and also brings more than 15 years experience coaching at international level.” The selection panel that concluded that Moles was the right person, included John Wright who was named as the national selector. Vaughan desires that Wright and Moles collaborate in the direction of success for New Zealand. While commenting about John Bracewell, Vaughan said that “John has achieved tremendous success with the New Zealand side, including Test series wins against South Africa, Sri Lanka and the West Indies, and one-day series victories over England, Australia, the West Indies, India, South Africa and Pakistan, among others.”