CF Correspondent

Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) has penned a final deal with English coach Toby Radford to appoint him as the head coach of the High Performance (HP) unit.

BCB director and its HP Committee Chairman Naimur Rahman Durjoy confirmed the news of Radford’s appointment as the next head coach of the HP. 

The English coach will replace Australian high-profile coach Simon Helmut, who finished a two-term stint in BCB.

“We have appointed Toby Radford as our next HP coach,” said BCB HP chairman Naimur Rahman.

“He (Radford) will be available for 100 days in a year. Initially we have appointed him for a year and after assessing his performance we will increase it further,” Durjoy told media.

Radford heads to Bangladesh with an illustrious coaching career on his resume, having excelled in his role as a head coach in various academies across the world. The Englishman’s first assignment is expected to be against the Sri Lankans in their own backyard with the BCB planning to send their HP unit along with the national team when they travel to Sri Lanka on September 23.

The board is keen on sending its HP team over to help the Test squad make the most of the quarantine period by playing practice games among themselves. In 2018, the HP unit was supposed to tour Sri Lanka, but the plans were shelved after the home board refused to bear the expenses for the proposed series.

Besides playing intra-squad games against their seniors, the high performance unit tour is also expected to consist of two four-day games and five 50-over matches against Sri Lanka’s emerging team.