Mark Butcher has thrown his backing behind Brendon McCullum to become England's new men's white-ball head coach, in addition to his role with the Test side.
Speaking on the Wisden Cricket Weekly podcast, Mark Butcher said that he believed Brendon McCullum was the right man for the job before he took the reigns with England's Test side, and was still firm in his belief the the New Zealander should take the role.
"I haven't got a long list of people that I think would be up for the job," said Butcher. "But I do think the best option – which is something that I thought way back in the midst of time before Baz came over and turned around England's Test fortunes – would be to have the same guy do both, with the flexibility that you have a deputy that you could hand over certain tours or periods of time to.
"I felt it at the time and I still feel it now, that having a split coaching system inevitably leads to comparisons, favourable or otherwise, with the guy that's doing the other job. You've got enough players that play in both formats for any sort of change in messaging to feel as though – 'we prefer the way this guy does it'.
"If I had the money and the cheque book and the power to make that call, I'd be on the phone to Baz and saying, 'look, is there a way that we can work this that works for you and works for us?' Obviously you'd have to pay him very well to do it but I still feel that's the best option."
McCullum took over as England Test captain ahead of the 2022 home summer from Chris Silverwood, who coached England in both red- and white-ball formats. Paul Collingwood was appointed interim coach for England's 2022 white-ball summer, and Matthew Mott took over ahead of the 2022 T20 World Cup. Mott stepped down from the role last month following England's second white-ball World Cup exit in seven months.
Other probables doing the rounds include Jonathan Trott, who recently finished his contract as Afghanistan's head coach, and Andy Flower, who previously coached England from 2009 to 2013. Flower was backed as the best option for the job by Michael Atherton in his column for The Times.
"I would shy away from going backwards to someone like Flower," said Butcher. "Despite his incredible CV of success all over the world with franchise teams. I would think it would be unlikely that they would go backwards in that regard."
England have previously experimented with separate red- and white-ball coaches: Ashley Giles took the white-ball side over from Flower in 2012, as Flower continued to coach the Test side. Peter Moores was then appointed as both red- and white-ball coach after Flower left at the end of 2013, combining the roles once again. From 2015 until Silverwood's departure in 2022, the roles remained combined.
"How would it work? Baz is in the country for much of the English summer anyway," said Butcher. "And England haven't been overburdened with white ball stuff over the course of this summer. It's only towards the back-end that they're going to play. Then you would make your choices around which overseas trips would be the ones that you would go, 'okay sit this one out and we'll have your deputy look after things there'. But the main messaging and the view on players would be the same across the board, and I think that's extremely important.
"What would be better than to have the same guy with the same messaging across both formats with largely the same group of players?"
Follow Wisden for all cricket updates, including live scores, match stats, quizzes and more. Stay up to date with the latest cricket news, player updates, team standings, match highlights, video analysis and live match odds.
