Glamorgan County Cricket Club chief executive Hugh Morris is to join the Wales Golf Board as a Non-Executive Director for high performance.
It is a role for which former Test cricketer Morris is very well qualified, as he is also a former managing director of England cricket at a time when the men’s Test team reached number one in the world and both the men’s and women’s teams won their respective World Cups.
A member of Royal Porthcawl, Morris is also a passionate golfer, who played off a handicap of five at his best and who still plays off single figures.
“I saw the advert and thought it was a really interesting role,” said Morris. “Lots of governing bodies are changing their constitutions to bring more skill sets through independents, but very few look at the high performance side, so I thought it was interesting Wales Golf have done that.
“I love golf and I have been involved in high performance sport for a long time, so I thought it could be a good match. Cricket is my career, but I love all sport, and golf has always been one of my passions along with rugby. I played golf from an early age, I am a member of Royal Porthcawl now and love it down there because it is a great course and a great club as well.
“The critical thing about the role is not to step on the toes of the executives who are running the show day to day, but to check, challenge and support them as much as you can as a non-executive.”
He added: “There are definitely some things you can learn from other sports. High performance is about selecting the right people, making sure players are working with the right coaches in good facilities, with a good competition structure – whether that’s football, cricket, rugby or golf.”
While being chief executive of Glamorgan clearly includes an oversight of the high performance and talent pathway sides, there is also a lot more to the job. However as managing director of England Cricket, Morris was involved full-time with the men’s and women’s elite games, as well as the talent development in setting up the National Cricket Performance Centre based at Loughborough.
In the period when Morris was in charge the women’s England cricket team took huge steps forward, winning the 2009 World Cup and going on an 18-month unbeaten streak, while the men won three Ashes Series in a row against Australia.
“I will try to provide the knowledge and experience I have gained over the years, including as managing director of England cricket for seven years,” said Morris. “The highlights were winning the Ashes three times in a row for the first time in 60 years, winning in Australia in 2010/11, winning in India for the first time in 28 years and winning an ICC global event for the first time at the 2010 T20 World Cup.
“We were the number one Test nation. There had not been official rankings in the past, but it was calculated that was the first time for 40 years. Women’s cricket was only merged with the England and Wales Cricket Board in 2000, so to take an emerging high performance programme and see the growth was really exciting.
Returning to golf, Morris added: “It is definitely one of the great advantages of Wales Golf that the men’s and women’s games are under the one umbrella. Clearly I do not have the technical knowledge of high performance golf, but I can ask the right questions and share some good experience.”
Wales Golf chief executive Hannah McAllister is delighted to have Morris join the Board. “To have Hugh’s experience feeding into Wales Golf will be a real bonus,” she said. “High performance sports can certainly feed off each other, while Hugh is also a passionate and knowledgeable golfer.
“Welsh golfers have had a good season, notching several landmarks that had not been achieved for many years such as the women reaching the top flight of the European Ladies Team Championships and the men finishing top 10 in the World Team Championships. Our Performance Director Gillian O’Leary is always keen to look for ways to improve further and being able to tap into the experience of someone like Hugh will be invaluable.”