Edwards, the former England captain turned decorated coach, has not ruled herself out of taking over the head coach role if it becomes available in the aftermath of the review, saying in an interview this week that she felt better equipped than she was two-and-a-half years ago, just before Jon Lewis replaced Lisa Keightley at the helm. But she was even stronger on lending her support to the ECB’s inquiry.
“I’m certainly more prepared because of some of the experiences I’ve had in the last few years,” Edwards told the BBC’s Stumped podcast. “I just want to help at the moment because I feel like this review’s taking place and I think they’ve got to ask people within the game what they think. I’ve got great experience across county level, working in the WBBL, that hopefully someone will pick up the phone and ask what we need to do to get better.
“That’s all I care about at the moment. I don’t care who coaches the team, who captains the team. I just want English cricket to get back to where it should be. And I think we’ve got to use people who know what’s going on to help and I feel I’m in a position to help and hopefully support the ECB in that process.”
Edwards would be a leading candidate as England Women’s head coach should the role become vacant given her outstanding success in the world’s top franchise leagues and at domestic level.
Having initially said she was interested in taking the England job in September 2022, Edwards decided against applying a couple of weeks later, saying she was enjoying her burgeoning franchise coaching career with Southern Brave in the Women’s Hundred and WBBL side Sydney Sixers, as well as leading Southern Vipers in the domestic women’s competition, which included a T20 competition named in her honour.
Edwards has led Southern Vipers to five titles, including two Charlotte Edwards Cup victories – the second as part of a domestic double in 2023 – and Southern Brave to three Women’s Hundred finals, winning the 2023 edition. She also led Sydney Sixers to the WBBL final in her first season in charge in 2022-23.
During that time, her franchise coaching portfolio expanded to include Mumbai Indians, who are about to begin their campaign for a second title in three years under her guidance, having won the inaugural WPL trophy. She has also been appointed head coach of Hampshire Women under the new domestic structure in England and Wales beginning this season.
Edwards said she watched much of the Women’s Ashes, where England were thumped by more than 50 runs in three white-ball matches and by an innings in the Test, with a sense of “real disappointment”.
“Hopefully this will be a moment, a line-in-the-sand moment, for the team and for the ECB to have a look at where we’re going with the women’s game because there’s a lot of good things happening and I think that’s what makes it sad for someone who’s involved in the system,” Edwards said. “There’s a lot of good things happening within the counties and the regional structure and it hasn’t necessarily been portrayed with the England team, so that’s a worry, I guess, and something that needs to be looked at.”
Lewis described England’s group-stage exit from the T20 World Cup in October as a “line-in-the-sand moment” and his position has come under increased pressure following that performance, most notably England’s shocking fielding display against West Indies, which knocked them out of the tournament.
During the Ashes, there were few signs of improvement in the field, which along with some poor decision-making with the bat and a failure to adapt under pressure from the Australians, saw England unable to pose any real challenge other than in the rain-affected second T20I, which they lost by six runs on the DLS method.
Since the T20 World Cup, England’s fitness has also come under scrutiny after commentator and former spinner Alex Hartley said that a handful of players were “letting the team down” with their fitness levels.
While Lewis has stood firm in his defence of England’s work in training, even suggesting that Australia’s outdoor lifestyle gave them an advantage in producing athletes, Edwards said there was plenty of ground to be made up to match Australia physically.
“I think if you do a comparison, they are more athletic and they are fitter and that’s what we need to now aspire to be like,” Edwards said. “That’s part of our jobs at county level is to now support these players to be fitter, to be more athletic so that we can compete with Australia, so there aren’t those question marks when we play them because that was the hardest thing, wasn’t it? Having that kind of noise in the background when it’s not just all about the cricket.
“I think we can turn this around. I don’t think it’s as big a gap as people make out that there is. I know that’s probably quite a stupid thing to say, having been beaten 16-nil, but we are talented, we have a lot of talent in our country, and I think now hopefully this moment we will be a moment we’ll look back on with, I guess, real positivity.”
The ECB review is expected to release its recommendations in the coming weeks.
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