SWINDON Cricket Club chairman Tom Foreman is hoping the signing of Phillip DeFreitas as their new head coach will help improve the club.

The former England star was named as the new County Ground chief on Tuesday, with the West of England Premier League club investing in their coaching structure rather than an overseas player for their coming WEPL Wiltshire campaign.

However, Foreman says that rather than go head-hunting for one of the game’s top former professionals, they placed a job advert with the Professional Cricketers’ Association (PCA).

“On receiving Phil’s response, one of the guys drove over to my house and started knocking on the door,” said Foreman.

“He said: ‘You’re not going to believe this’. I said: ‘What? What’s up?’ I thought that there was some sort of problem. He said: ‘You’ll never guess who has applied – only Phil Defreitas.’ “We are really pleased that someone like Phil has considered us, talked to us and felt we were the right fit for him for what he wants to achieve as a coach over the next few years.”

However, despite receiving an application from a man who played in 44 Tests and 103 one-day internationals – including two World Cup finals – Foreman said that they did not immediately offer DeFreitas the job.

“He came down and we had a good chat. He was very personable and we talked about how you build a club ethic and bringing youngsters through from juniors to senior cricket on to the first XI,” the Swindon chairman explained.

“We talked about a number of things and he seemed to like what we were trying to achieve. It fit with his ethos and following a formal interview process, he said that he would like to work with us.

“I think it fair to say that there has been a significant investment (in bringing in DeFreitas). I’d say based on our ethos, we are approaching this in the right way.

“We are a community club, we want to attract young players to the club; we want them to enjoy playing for Swindon and to progress.

“You need a good coaching structure and an experienced head coach to put in a unified plan from U9s all the way through to senior cricket.

“By doing so, you have a consistent pipeline of players competing for spots in the team knowing that someone is not going to come in, like an overseas, taking away opportunities from those players.”