Charlotte Edwards, Mark Lane and Clare Connor plot England's path for success • Getty Images
Fans of the Terminator films will know that Connor girls are bred tough.
Clare Connor, the ECB's head of women's cricket, is no exception - much to
the great advantage of the women's game at large.
The sport needs such players as Ellyse Perry for its on-pitch pin-ups, but
such advocates as Connor, herself a one-time articulate face of English
cricket, are absolutely crucial to make sure the game's structure and
development are as strong as possible. In late 2007, when she was
appointed in the ECB role, Connor - the former England captain - seemed a bit surprised to be asked. If she was, she was the only one.
No stranger to hard work, Connor had already combined the England captaincy,
and being its blonde, serious representative in the media, along with
teaching English and PE. She led England to the 2005 World Cup semi-finals
but at 29 she retired from cricket, exhausted. Ever
passionate, she continued to battle on behalf of the women's game for
improved conditions such as contracts.
Then came the chance to make the difference, which she surrendered
teaching to take up. Once in charge she
set about restructuring county cricket, helped introduce the Chance to Shine contracts (supported by the Cricket Foundation), and assisted in the appointment of some key coaches. She also sits on the ICC women's committee and the Sussex board.
In Sydney to see the current fruits of her labours - and
those of the team and support staff - she is impossibly fresh and articulate
despite just having arrived from London. She's enthused by England's World Cup
campaign so far. "We've tried to steer clear of the favourites tag," she says,
trying to contain her excited hopes. "But if you're looking at the
number of wins in a given period statistically, and with Claire Taylor and
Isa Guha the best in the world at what they do, and Charlotte Edwards, Sarah
Taylor and Holly Colvin also up high in those rankings, if you step back and
you're completely objective about it, then we have come into this tournament
with a really, really strong chance."
Appointing a full-time strength and conditioning coach has helped England gain the
athletic edge on even Australia, while the influence of full-time coach Mark
Lane and his part-time assistant Jack Birkenshaw is not to be underestimated. Lane, a former Kenya men's assistant, has coached women for many years, including Taylor, Edwards and even Connor. Under him, Claire Taylor went from being "quite limited" 10 years ago to the world's best batsman. "She was a hockey player, very bottom hand, very strong but quite limited. She didn't have by any means the all-round game she's got now."
"Do we need to go to national netball finals and give out flyers about cricket? Do we need to go to national hockey competitions and say, 'Come for a taste, see whether you like it?' "
Lane complements Edwards, the captain, well. "They're both very much
heart-on-their-sleeve kind of people, setting high standards. The girls know
exactly where they stand with both Lottie and Mark - there's no grey areas."
Best of all, Lane isn't using women's cricket as a stepping stone to higher
honours with the men. "He's wanted this job for a number
of years," Connor says. "The impact he's had speaks for itself."
As for Birkenshaw, the former Leicestershire spinner, "He's got those
completely undefinable qualities that come from experience, coupled with
passion, real cricket knowledge and humour. He's very highly thought of
everywhere and in any cricket circles back home, he spreads the word. He
tells people how good these girls are, how hard they train, how committed
they are - which the girls massively value in someone of this calibre."
The players themselves
are feeling more valued thanks to their contracts. "The contracts have made
them feel they've got a real role to play within the game and the ECB and
the Cricket Foundation. They've been able to have a much better
work-life-training balance, rather than this crazy life I used to lead
trying to have a full-time career."
Now they can dedicate much more of their time to cricket. Some took extra
winter training in Bangalore - "It was no holiday, it was eight hours of
hard work a day" - where they faced spin from male net bowlers all day. Some
also went to Australia to play. "There's pros and cons to the girls playing
overseas," Connor says. "It's harder to monitor them, not in a Big Brother
way but in a technical, 'What's their game looking like? How are they
playing the cover drives? How's their slower ball?'" A few players stayed in
home nets, working every week with Lane, with positive results.
With the current England side in safe hands, Connor knows what she
wants when it comes to developing the next generation. "If someone said to
me, 'Okay, you've got another half a million in your budget, would you pay the
players?' Well, probably not, no. I don't think there's anything to be
gained from saying 'Is the next step for it to go professional?' It probably
isn't. It's to work out how to develop the next wave of players, the next
high-potential 16- to 21-year-olds for when those other players go. You
can't afford to have a big transition.
"From my own experience and
lots of girls I played with, you got picked for England but you didn't
perform for England for years because you hadn't been in the right
environment for long enough to go straight in. You've got so few players to
pick from, so you spot some talent and you spot some commitment and you
stick them in an England shirt. Certainly I was given that opportunity far
too early, and I'm sure lots of my team-mates would agree themselves."
Edwards is one of the strong exceptions; she made her Test debut at 16 and
her first hundred in her second one-dayer, and her average has been
consistently in the late 30s ever since.
Talent identification
interests Connor hugely and she admits that at the moment
picking the best juniors would be "a bit hit and miss."
Looking at other sports is one option. "Do we need to go to national netball
finals and give out flyers about cricket?" she wonders. "Do we need to go
to national hockey competitions and say, 'Come for a taste, see whether you
like it? Not to poach them from other sports, obviously," she adds quickly,
smiling, "because that wouldn't be a good move as a national governing body.
Whilst we're doing loads to develop girls' cricket in schools and clubs, if
girls are already very talented, have got very good hand-eye co-ordination,
with good power and agility and good speed in other sports, then maybe some
skills are transferable."
When talented players are attracted to the game, providing a supported path
is the next vital step - "Not a rubbish experience, with filthy changing rooms
and a club which doesn't really want them and being put on a rubbish wicket
and being given bad officials," Connor says. "None
of this is acceptable. It's got to be a quality experience that they rave
about and that they stay involved in during their slightly tumultuous
teenage years."
With Connor on board - and feeling "lucky" to be in such a position -
women's cricket has every chance to get stronger and stronger. It's not just
England who have good support and funding, however. Such are the strides of
top sides such as Australia that the gap between them and the rest is being
dangerously widened. It is in her capacity as Europe representative on the
ICC committee that Connor can help.
"It's a global challenge to make sure some of these really exciting teams in
Tanzania and Zimbabwe and Japan have got real opportunity to go through
[ICC] regional tournaments and to have a goal of the World Cup qualifiers.
What I'm doing in my job is with the ideas of pathways and making sure they
are proper, whether it's a 14-year-old girl down in Devon or whether it's a
24-year-old in Pakistan. That's our biggest challenge. Everyone's got to
have something aspirational, don't they?"
On that note she goes back outside to watch England beat New Zealand
and further their own hopes and desires. And if Connor has her way, the next
global generation of female players will all one day be able to reach out
for even better support and touch their own dreams.