New junior coach follows his heart to be a Bear

Warwickshire’s new Youth Pathway Coach Alex Laud turned his back on a career in law to follow his passion for cricket coaching.

Law graduate Alex spent the last seven years working as a solicitor in a Birmingham legal services firm where he specialised in public family law.

The 30-year-old – an experienced league cricketer who captains Earlswood CC’s First XI – spent his spare time coaching cricket-mad youngsters and training for his Advanced Coach qualification.

And now he’s chosen to follow his heart after successfully applying to become the Club’s    Early Years High Performance Coach for under-10s to under-12s.

“It’s certainly not your standard route into cricket coaching,” said Alex. “I spent 10 years in total studying law and then working in a law firm, but my passion has always been cricket. 

“I’ve played for as long as I can remember, since four-years-old in the garden and then junior cricket from eight onwards. 

“I worked as a casual coach on the pathway, learning from the team here, and a club coach for a long time as well. My involvement on the pathway gradually increased over the last couple of years and I found I was enjoying it more and more. The success of the U10s intra-county programme really was the spark for me. 

“I wanted to do something I genuinely enjoy every day. Cricket is in my blood and I enjoy helping young players learn and develop, as people as well as players. You can see a real impact over a 12-month cycle and being able to improve the state of cricket around the county is an amazing position to be in.”

The Independent Commission into Equity in Cricket (ICEC) report set out a number of recommendations for county pathways to adopt that are designed to identify and nurture young talent and promote cricket to more children.

Warwickshire Head of High Performance Paul Greetham, added: “The ECB are working through what these proposals will look like but I have no doubt we’re on the right track – and Alex will be instrumental in delivering this work.

“We’re reaching more young players and running an intra-county under-10s programme of coaching and matches alongside our county partner Staffordshire. 

“We want to ensure access to representative cricket is ‘barrier-free’ and accessible regardless of a child’s background. And to achieve that we’re increasingly looking for proactive ways to engage in grassroots cricket, in conjunction with the Warwickshire Cricket Board, to accelerate talent development and encourage participation.”