South Western Districts Cricket, on Wednesday, announced the appointment of Andy Moles as the new Head Coach. Moles, who hails from Warwickshire in England, will be in charge with the Oudtshoorn based team for the next two seasons.
Moles, who played for Warwickshire between 1986 and 1998 as an opening batsman, also spent five seasons with Griqualand West in Kimberley where he concluded his first class playing career.
“Being appointed as head coach of South Western Districts comes as a huge privilege and opportunity and I am looking forward to make a difference here”, he said. “I have followed the structures and growth in SWD during the past decade and I firmly believe that there is a pool of exceptional talent in the Southern Cape”.
His coaching career in South Africa started in 1998 as head coach of Free State where players like Boeta Dippenaar, Nicky Boje, Morn van Wyk and Johan van der Watt emerged to play for South Africa. He coached Kenya from 2003-2005 when they qualified to play in the Intercontinental Cup Final in 2005. During his stint with Scotland as national coach they qualified as the number one seeded team from ICC associate countries.
In 2006 he was the England u/19 coach but the highlight of his career was in 2008/2009 as head coach of the New Zealand Black Caps. With Moles at the helm they drew the Chappel Hadley Series in Australia, won the T20 series against India and Sri Lanka and qualified for the Champions Trophy final in 2009.
In 2014 and 2015 he coached Afganistan in the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand when Afganistan won their first Cricket World Cup match and qualified for the 2016 World T20 in India.
“Andy has achieved great success at every level he has coached at and we expect that he will continue to achieve such success at SWD upon his appointment as our new head coach,” says SWD Cricket President, Rudy Claassen. “We believe that he has what it takes to get the best out of our players as he brings something special with him in that he has a proven track record and hopefully his experience and expertise aids in SWD winning some silverware in the near future.”
Albertus Kennedy, SWD Cricket CEO, confirmed that Moles will take office from 1 July 2016, in time to start pre-season preparations. His first assignment will be over the period 15-17 September when SWD will host Pool B of the Africa T20 in Oudtshoorn. SWD, together with Kenya, Northern Cape and the defending champions, Northerns will contest Pool B of the competition.
