Noffke, Love, Seccombe round out Bulls support staff

Queensland have signed a trio of former stalwarts in Ashley Noffke, Martin Love and Wade Seccombe to round out the coaching and support staff for the Bulls and the Brisbane Heat Twenty20 side this summer.

Noffke has returned from Western Australia to become the state's bowling coach, replacing Joe Dawes after his departure for South Australia, while Love (physio) and Seccombe (fielding consultant) will play inconspicuous but important roles for the state they helped take to an unprecedented era of success over a decade from 1995.

Seccombe was a contender for the Australian fielding coach role that ultimately went to the former New Zealand and New South Wales coach Steve Rixon.

Their acquisitions, alongside that of Trevor Hohns as the chairman of selectors and state talent manager, will aid the efforts of the head coach Darren Lehmann to help the state regain its on-field poise after some poor results in recent seasons.

"They are smart, talented, dedicated and good people to boot,'' Lehmann said. "It's fantastic to be able to have people around who set exceptional standards when they played and I know they will provide our teams with first class preparations across the season.

"It's great to have someone like Lovey in such a key role as our physio because he has experienced it all as a player and can give the players some real insights. He and our strength and conditioning coach Damian Mednis are great resources to draw upon in terms of our off-field planning and performance."

Hohns' appointment has sparked some speculation that he may want to be part of the national set-up again after quitting as Cricket Australia's chairman of selectors in 2006, and Lehmann said the Bulls would have been "mad" not to court him.

"He dropped me about three or four times and every time he had full reason to and he was right. He was a very good selector, one of the ones I really enjoyed talking to," Lehmann said.

"I spoke to him a few times but at the end of the day it is his decision to apply and you love blokes like that being involved because he was a very good selector for Australia and he has great thoughts on the game.

"So his knowledge of the game is very good, and the respect he has in Queensland, and the role he played in helping Australia get to No. 1 was exceptional, so we'd be mad not to have someone like that wanting to get back involved utilising his talents to get us to where we want to go."