Stars appoint English coach as Hussey's replacement

The Melbourne Stars have added another Englishman to their coaching stable with Peter Moores signed as men's head coach to replace club legend David Hussey.

Moores, a former England head coach from 2007-09 and 2014-15, joins countryman Jonathan Batty at the Stars after he was appointed as the club's WBBL head coach last May.

Moores, who played 231 first-class and 245 List A matches across a 15-year career before moving into coaching, inherits a Stars list that has missed the finals for the past three seasons and finished dead last in KFC BBL|12 this summer with just three wins from 14 games.

Added to that is Melbourne, along with the Hobart Hurricanes, are the two clubs yet to lift the BBL trophy despite the Stars having made the finals in eight of the competition’s 12 seasons.

It's a task 60-year-old Moores is no stranger to having guided Sussex to their first ever division one County Championship title in 2003 and was in charge of Lancashire when they won their first Championship title for 77 years in 2011.

And since joining Nottinghamshire in 2016, they have won four trophies in all three of England's domestic competitions, two of which have come in the T20 Blast under the leadership of recently retired BBL star Dan Christian.

He also coached the county to the division two title last year, securing promotion to the top division for 2023.

"I'm really looking forward to the opportunity to work with some of the best players in the world but also to help develop the rest of the squad to get this club back where they belong," Moores said.

He has signed a two-year deal with the club and will balance his time between both the Stars and Notts head coach roles.

Stars general manager Blair Crouch said Moores was the outstanding candidate from an exhaustive worldwide search to replace Hussey after he was appointed full-time role of Head of Male Cricket at Cricket Victoria.

"Peter has built a very strong resume over a long period of time both at domestic and international level and we look forward to him sharing all of that knowledge and experience with our group," Crouch said.

"We are well aware of the challenge ahead of us, rest assured the entire club is working as hard as we can to rise back up the BBL ladder and Peter is the best man to lead this group."

Crouch has previously flagged that "everything is on the table" to rejuvenate the list to avoid a fourth consecutive campaign without finals, with the Stars set to trade Australia's leading white-ball spinner Adam Zampa to the Melbourne Renegades in exchange for wicketkeeper Sam Harper.

Moores is set to have club captain Glenn Maxwell at his disposal in BBL|13 after the star allrounder missed all last season with a broken leg.

With Zampa set to be traded once the BBL's contracting embargo lifts following the completion of a new Memorandum of Understanding between Cricket Australia and the players' union, Moores first job will be to piece together a new bowling attack with young quick Brody Couch the only bowler contracted for next season.

Nathan Coulter-Nile, Sam Elliott, Liam Hatcher, Cameron McClure, Clint Hinchliffe and Tom O'Connell are all yet to sign new deals for BBL|13, while young batters Campbell Kellaway and Tom Rogers are also with contracts but impressed during BBL|12.

Contracted for BBL|13: Joe Burns, Hilton Cartwright, Brody Couch, Nick Larkin, Glenn Maxwell (BBL15), Marcus Stoinis, Beau Webster, Adam Zampa (BBL14) *Contract expires at the end of BBL|13 unless specified

Off contract: Nathan Coulter-Nile, Sam Elliott, Liam Hatcher, Clint Hinchliffe, Campbell Kellaway, Cameron McClure, Tom O'Connell