'I'm just Coach' - Sarah Taylor on building cricket's next generation of men and women

"I'm just 'Coach'." It's a moniker Sarah Taylor accepts as a huge compliment but, over the course of a six-year career mentoring some of the brightest stars in world cricket - men and women - she has proved herself to be that and more.

A modern-day pioneer as a woman coaching in men's set-ups around the globe, Taylor is still learning. But the humanity she brings to the role - built partly on some harsh lessons from her own decorated playing career - is striking.

And it has been there for the benefit of players who have come under her guidance so far, whether at Sussex, Team Abu Dhabi and Manchester Originals or, currently, England Lions and WPL side Gujarat Giants.

"I'm now going to say that they are just one, they are just coaching, no matter which environment," she tells ESPNcricinfo's Powerplay podcast when the inevitable question arises as to whether she prefers coaching men or women.

She was speaking on the eve of the WPL Eliminator, in which the Giants team with whom she has been working as fielding coach lost to Delhi Capitals. The victors will now face Royal Challengers Bangalore in Thursday's Final.

Her next assignment will be a return to men's cricket for England Lions' series against Pakistan Shaheens in the UAE, having already worked as an assistant to head coach Andrew Flintoff over the past two years on tours of South Africa and Australia.

"I was worried about how I was going to be received [by the men]," she says. "I would be stupid to say that I wasn't worried at all. I was absolutely worried about it.

"Working at Manchester in the men's stuff, having worked at Sussex, having pretty much grown up playing boys' and men's cricket, I felt like I had a little bit of an edge because I understood what the environment would slightly be, but I was absolutely petrified going up to Loughborough.

"They just call me 'Coach'. That's it, I'm just 'Coach'. The odd time I'll be Sarah… It's almost the biggest compliment you could ever give me by just calling me Coach.

"I feel at home here in the women's game and I feel at home there in the men's game, and it's a very bizarre process, but it is pretty decent, I'm pretty happy."

Taylor echoes the likes of Mandla Mashimbyi, the South Africa Women's head coach, and former England Women's head coach Jon Lewis, in believing there isn't much difference between coaching men and women.

Both men faced questions over what they knew about coaching women when they were appointed. When Mashimbyi took up the role in 2024 of the back of a career in men's domestic cricket, he said: "Cricket remains cricket. The same language that I use with the boys is the same language I use with these girls." Meanwhile, Lewis said upon his move from the England Men's set-up in 2022, "you don't coach gender, you coach people".

Taylor says of any perceived difference: "The obvious stuff, like the speed of the guys and the power of the guys, but no, there's not really.

"You could probably meet in the middle a little bit with their emotions. Sometimes guys need to open up a bit more, and then some girls need to probably - not necessarily open up less - but just be a bit more hard-hitting with their emotions. But in terms of where the attitude around the game is now, from when I was playing, most people, they approach the game very similarly. The professionalism around women's cricket at the minute is up there with the men."

In her playing days, Taylor was regarded as one of the best wicketkeepers in world cricket, regardless of gender. But she also became an early role model for players speaking up about their mental-health struggles. And it is this experience that undoubtedly informs her approach to coaching, focusing on the person as much as the player.

Taylor suffered overwhelming anxiety and panic attacks during the course of her 226-game international career and took a break from the sport as a result, in 2016, before helping England win the 50-over World Cup at home the following year.

"I've got older, which helps, you start caring less what people think," she says. "That doesn't mean I don't, it just means I care less what people think, which actually then takes that emotion away and then I can then look at the facts.

"When I played, I ignored the facts completely and I was worrying about everything else. Because I'm not playing, it's also easy for me to then remove that and then I'm purely factual.

"But I've noticed in the last couple of years, I'm very player-focused. 'How are you? Are you okay? How are we going to get the best out of you?' And that's been the biggest journey for me as a coach, because I knew that if I wasn't okay, there's no way I was going to score runs, just as a human being, so there was no point in me stepping out sometimes."

With that maturity and experience comes an acceptance that she and her charges can't control everything, which is something she has been teaching at Gujarat Giants.

"You ultimately don't want the players to put so much pressure on themselves to do so well, and I talk a lot about Mother Cricket," Taylor says. "If Mother Cricket wants you to score runs, they'll score runs, right?

"It's trying to get the girls to recognise, just because they've done X, Y, Z and ticked every box, doesn't mean that you're going to score runs, doesn't mean you're going to take loads of wickets, but you're just giving yourself the best chance. I didn't appreciate that when I played.

"It doesn't mean you're all of a sudden this bad human being because you've played a rash shot. You're still a wonderful human being, but you just made a mistake and that's okay."

Despite not ending the WPL as the Giants would have hoped, head coach Michael Klinger saw "huge improvement" in his side, who finished second after the league stage having also reached the Eliminator last year, and backed them to return stronger for the experience.

Looking further into the future, what does it hold for Taylor?

"I've never been one to plan, you know, with the kind of five-year, ten-year plan, my brain does not work that way - if anything, I'd get probably slightly overwhelmed," she says. "There's a head coach role for me at some point. I'm not there yet, absolutely not there yet. Whether it's in the men's or women's game, who knows?

"I've still got lots to learn. I'm surrounded by unbelievable coaches. I've never written so much down in my life, listening to how they talk, how they deal with players, how they approach everything. I'm going to keep learning, become the best version of a coach that I can possibly be for me, and then kick on and see where that takes me."