South Africa coach Mark Boucher is favourite to succeed Mahela Jayawardene as the head coach of IPL side Mumbai Indians.
Boucher is the front runner after having relinquished his post as the South African coach, serving only till the T20 World Cup. The Mumbai Indians organisation confirmed Simon Katich’s hiring as the head coach of their Cape Town franchise on Thursday in a media statement, adding that Hashim Amla will serve as his assistant as the team’s batting coach, while Robin Peterson will serve as general manager. Fielding coach James Pamment will remain in his position.
Reliance Industries Limited, which also owns MI Emirates in the UAE’s ILT20 league and IPL powerhouse Mumbai Indians, are the owner of MI Cape Town. Rashid Khan, Liam Livingstone, Sam Curran, Kagiso Rabada, and Dewald Brevis who also represents the team in the Indian Premier League were the first SA20 team to make their five direct signings public in August. MI Cape Town was the first SA20 side to do so before the auction. September 19 is the announced date for the SA20 player auction in Cape Town.
The club recently revamped its current coaching setup, which was followed by the hiring of additional support staff. Zaheer Khan, who served as the director of cricket operations up until last season, has been promoted to the position of global head of cricket development, replacing Mahela Jayawardene, who has been the head coach of the Mumbai Indians since 2017. Both of them will be involved with the group’s three teams.
One of Jayawardene’s responsibilities is to supervise the coaching staffs at each of the three franchises. To that end, he collaborated with the ownership group of the Mumbai Indians to determine the coaching staffs for each of the three teams, the specifics of which are anticipated to be revealed this week.
Since Jayawardene assumed his new position, there has been much speculation regarding who will take over as coach of the IPL squad, and Boucher may be the right candidate.
Boucher abruptly resigned as South Africa’s head coach on Monday, effective after South Africa’s participation in the next T20 World Cup in Australia, causing a stir. South Africa had just lost a Test series in England by a score of 2-1. Boucher wants to “pursue other interests and opportunities,” CSA CEO Pholetsi Moseki said at the time.
