Grant Flower joins Sussex Cricket as batting coach

Sussex Cricket is thrilled to announce the appointment of Grant Flower as the club’s batting coach.

Grant arrives at The 1st Central County Ground with over a decade of coaching experience at international level.

He joins Sussex after two years as batting coach for the Sri Lanka national side. He performed the same role for Pakistan between 2014 and 2019 and for Zimbabwe between 2010 and 2014.

Grant’s domestic coaching CV includes stints at Essex County Cricket Club and Midwest Rhinos in Zimbabwe.

All that followed a distinguished playing career that saw him score over 10,000 runs in 288 international matches. Zimbabwe’s most capped one-day international player with 221 appearances, Grant’s 6,571 ODI runs make him his country’s third-highest run-scorer in the format. He is also part of a select group of players with 1,000 runs and 100 wickets in ODIs.

His experience of the English game includes six seasons as a player with Essex from 2005 to 2010, during which time the team won three one-day trophies. 

Upon joining Sussex Grant Flower said: “It gives me great pleasure to be added to the Sussex coaching staff and I can’t wait to start. I have been told about the exciting young batters coming through the ranks and am excited to be given the opportunity of hopefully improving them along their journey.

“I always enjoyed playing against the Sharks and admired their professional approach and ultra-competitiveness. Hopefully I can add to that with some of my international coaching experiences and help contribute to make the Sharks batting unit both reliable and exciting.”

Welcoming Grant to Hove, Sussex’s Championship & One-Day Head Coach, Ian Salisbury said: “Grant is an absolutely fantastic addition to our staff. I’ve known him since my first trip to Zimbabwe in 1989 and can vouch for his personal qualities, while his coaching and playing record speak for themselves.

“With a young squad in the early stage of their careers, the quality of the coaching set-up is absolutely vital. To add someone with Grant’s track record alongside people like James Kirtley, Sarah Taylor, Ash Wright and Mike Yardy puts us in a really strong position. I feel humbled to be working alongside this group.

“There have been some challenges over the past year or so, but we’ve got to look forward now. We’ve got a brilliant coaching team in place, the medical and S&C teams are doing great work with the lads’ fitness, we’ve got the marquee going up early in the New Year, so we’re in a great position to now focus on the squad’s cricketing skills as we build up to the start of the season.”

Sussex’s Performance Director, Keith Greenfield added: “To have such a high quality batting coach with the experience that Grant has come and join us at such a crucial time to help develop our young squad is absolutely fantastic.”

Grant replaces Jason Swift who has decided to leave the club to pursue other opportunities. We thank him for his time and efforts over the past eight years and wish him the best for the future.