Seccombe and McKay join Renegades and Stars as high performance managers

Melbourne Renegades have hired Brisbane Heat BBL title-winning coach Wade Seccombe as their new high performance manager while former Australia fast bowler Clint McKay will take over as Melbourne Stars’ equivalent with the two clubs creating the new roles in an attempt to improve their on-field performance.

Seccombe coached Heat to their second BBL title earlier this year, having led them to the BBL final the season before, but lost his job as Heat and Queensland coach after a review by Queensland Cricket into the poor performance of the men’s Sheffield Shield team.

Cricket Victoria had advertised for the two newly created high performance roles that are aligned to each of the BBL teams following several years of underperformance before Seccombe departed from Queensland. Previously, the high performance elements of the two Melbourne BBL clubs including list management, coaching and high performance structures had been handled by the club’s two general managers Blair Crouch (Stars) and James Rosengarten (Renegades) in addition to overseeing the entire commercial operation of their respective clubs.

Seccombe will move from Brisbane to Melbourne to take up the full-time role with Renegades later this month.

McKay moves from the backroom staff at Stars, where he was the bowling coach, to his new role having previously been involved in Stars’ overseas draft and list strategy. McKay has also been regularly seconded into Australia’s coaching set-up in the past two years as a stand-in white-ball bowling coach when incumbent Daniel Vettori has been rested or promoted as a stand-in head coach.

The two appointments will bring greater alignment between the two BBL clubs and Victoria’s high performance program that is run by Graham Manou.

“It is really pleasing to be able to have two people of Clint and Wade’s calibre joining our cricket performance program at Cricket Victoria and working closely with both our Big Bash clubs,” Manou said.

“They will play a vital role in the talent management and identification process with a specific focus on T20 skills and potential. They will also be an active part of our existing elite and development programs, putting a renewed emphasis on T20 cricket within our programs.”

Previously, the BBL clubs have made list management decisions independent of Victoria’s program. That is likely to change with the two appointments after Nic Maddinson was dropped off Renegades list and then decided to also leave Victoria’s state program to head home to New South Wales. The recruitment of Josh Brown to Renegades and Victoria is an example of how the programs are likely to work together in the future.

Seccombe’s first job will be to oversee the recruitment of a new head coach at Renegades after David Saker was sacked with a year to run on his contract. Former Australia players Shane Watson and Cameron White have both been publicly linked to the role without beginning a formal process.