Stuart sacked as coach of New South Wales

Anthony Stuart has been sacked as coach of New South Wales after a board meeting in Sydney on Tuesday night.

Stuart took over as head coach in May 2011 and his two-year contract was due to expire at the end of this season, but Cricket New South Wales has confirmed in a statement that Stuart has finished his coaching duties with the state "with immediate effect". Chandika Hathurusingha, the former Sri Lanka Test player who was an assistant coach under Stuart, will take over as acting head coach for the rest of the 2012-13 season.

Stuart has not had a particularly successful tenure since he took over from Matthew Mott last year; the Blues won only one Sheffield Shield game last summer. This season they were sitting in fourth position with two wins at the time of his departure, and in the Ryobi Cup they had managed only one victory from four games.

"At a meeting of the NSW cricket board last evening it was determined that Anthony Stuart's contract to coach the NSW SpeedBlitz Blues will not be renewed and he has finished duties as head coach with immediate effect," Cricket New South Wales said in a statement.

The chief executive David Gilbert said: "Cricket NSW records its thanks to Anthony for his efforts and commitment over the past 18 months. We wish Anthony well in his future endeavours."

Stuart, the former fast bowler who took a hat-trick in one of his three ODI appearances for Australia, had been coach of Wellington in New Zealand before he joined New South Wales.