So it was rather strange to see the post advertised last week. Of course, the England and Wales Cricket Board is quite rightly acting swiftly upon Morris’s resignation – even if he will remain in the post until the end of the year – but you just assumed that Morris would always be a fixture within the organisation.
He has, after all, been there in a variety of roles, all performed with the utmost diligence and excellence, since retiring from the game in 1997.
There is now disbelief in Wales; disbelief that Morris has been tempted back to his former county to sort a mess long in the making. Morris will be chief executive and director of cricket. As one player said to me: "There is quite literally no better person in the whole world to do the job."
But if Glamorgan have struck gold, what now about the ECB? It should be remembered that the managing director’s role was only introduced upon the recommendation of the Schofield Report after the 5-0 Ashes drubbing in 2006-07. Morris was actually part of that report and there were some screams of a "job for the boy" when he was appointed.
The truth, however, is that there was no better man; a former England international with business experience (an MBA), a sports science degree, extensive knowledge of the ECB’s coaching systems (he set up the National Academy), as well as a Level Four coach himself.
To my knowledge there is nobody like that banging at the door right now. The job description is interesting in that it stresses that "international playing experience" is required.
Presumably that is in cricket. No, I’m not being silly for the sake of it. Australia recently copied England and appointed an equivalent of Morris, but it was a former rugby union international, Pat Howard, rather than a former cricketer.
On which point it has been interesting to read that Mickey Arthur, the Australia coach summarily sacked just before the Ashes, has been in talks with Super??15 rugby franchise Western Force about a role in talent development and recruitment.
However, I cannot see the ECB appointing someone like Sir Clive Woodward (although Rob Andrew, the Rugby Football Union’s professional rugby director was once accomplished enough as a cricketer to have scored a first-class century for Cambridge University).
The contenders are more likely to be Andrew Strauss, then three current directors of cricket: Angus Fraser (Middlesex), Mike Watkinson (Lancashire), Martyn Moxon (Yorkshire), and maybe the ECB’s own Steve Elworthy. None of them fit the role as snugly as Morris did.
If Strauss should want the job, then you suspect it would be his, although, if Andy Flower stays on as team director, there would then be the curious role reversal of former captain Strauss suddenly being Flower’s boss.
What is sure is that the appointment will not come from the current crop of county chief executives, of whom only two – David Smith at Northamptonshire and David Leatherdale at Worcestershire – played first-class cricket. In that respect Morris’s return to Glamorgan is a boon for the county game in general, providing some much-needed cricketing intelligence and clout.
There is simply too little of it. Of course, there are some who believe that former professionals are not necessarily the best people to fill such positions.
I am reminded of the recent comment of Michael Henderson, who, writing in The Cricketer magazine, concluded a piece about the spirit of cricket furore surrounding Stuart Broad with the words: "Cricket is too fine a game to be left in the hands of professionals."
In administration posts, however, it can also be too complex for pure businesspeople. As in most things, balance is required.
Cricketers can be blinkered as Mike Atherton noted to an extreme in a column last week – "very few players I played with (in fact, I cannot think of a single example) thought of the wider questions of the good of the game".
Some like Strauss have probably always had that broader vision. Retirement may have broadened it even more. He has been a useful addition to Sky Sports’ coverage this summer, as well as penning some decent stuff for a rival rag, but too many of his ilk are lost from the inside of the game.
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