Durham have appointed former Netherlands manager Ryan Campbell as head coach on a three-year contract.
The 50-year-old replaces James Franklin at Chester-le-Street.
Campbell spent four years in charge of the Dutch national team, having previously worked as a batting coach for Hong Kong.
“I am extremely honored to be appointed as Durham’s head coach and can’t wait to get started,” said the Australian. told the club’s website.
He suffered an unexplained cardiac arrest in April and was placed in an induced coma for seven days.
“I crashed down a slide with my daughter and luckily landed on the foot of a girl whose mother had just taken a CPR class two weeks ago and she saved my life. life”, Campbell told the BBC’s Stumped podcast in June.
“The more I thought about it – and my wife told me how close it was – I made some changes, and I won’t let the little things bother me so much. Family is the number one priority and sometimes, working in sport, you can kind of forget that.”
He returned to his role with the Netherlands and led them to a fourth-place finish in their group at the T20 World Cup in Australia last month, including a famous victory against South Africa.
Campbell ‘the best candidate for Durham’
Campbell takes over at Durham after former New Zealand international Franklin left in September.
Franklin led them to the One Day Cup final in 2021, but the team struggled in the County Championship last season, finishing sixth in Division Two.
Cricket manager Marcus North believes Campbell, who has made two one-day appearances for Australia, is the right man to take County forward.
“After a thorough recruitment process, it became clear that Ryan was the best fit for Durham and the county,” North said.
“Ryan comes to Durham with an excellent reputation after a successful period as Netherlands head coach.
“I look forward to working with him and continuing to build on the foundation laid over the past four years with this exciting group of players.”
