Steve Waugh should coach Australian team: Jones

MELBOURNE - Cricket Australia needs to draw on its former greats to restore it as a cricket power and former skipper Steve Waugh should take control of the Australian side, said former cricketer Dean Jones.

He said Australian cricket should find the money to lure Waugh as its next coach, and added this summer’s Ashes humiliation should bring down the curtain on a system that had provided wrong coaches.

Australia was dismissed for 281 this morning as England celebrated historic 3-1 series win. For the first time in history, Australia lost three matches in a series by more than an innings.

Jones, a 52-Test veteran, said Cricket Australia needed to pay the necessary money to attract former greats into coaching roles, instead of seeing them lost to better offers overseas or in the media, The Herald Sun reports.

“It’s time for Steve Waugh to coach the team and to get Cricket Australia to start employing blokes who have played a bit of international cricket,” Jones said.

“Some of the young kids coming through state cricket, we kiss them on the backside and cajole them along, and that’s fine, but ultimately some truths have to be said,” he said.

“(Truths) about guys getting out in the last over of the day, all this silly stuff like flashing outside the off stump. If they (the coaches) have never played for Australia, they (the players) get away with it.

“But the players respect you if you’ve been there, done that. All the great AFL coaches have been there done that,” he added.

Jones’ comments were a clear shot at Australian coach Tim Nielsen, who played 101 first-class games for South Australia as a wicketkeeper-batsman but never reached international level. (ANI)