Cooley new head coach of Australian academy

Melbourne:

Australian bowling coach Troy Cooley on Monday succeeded Greg Chappell as the head coach of Cricket Australia's Centre of Excellence in Brisbane. Chappell has now become the National Talent manager.

Despite the new job, Cooley will continue to support the Australia team's Ashes and 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup campaigns.

"Cooley will build on the outstanding success of Greg Chappell in the role, and his elevation comes at a time when Australia is embarking on the Vodafone Ashes campaign and ICC Cricket World Cup defence," CA said in a statement.

"I'm excited to be appointed to this challenging role. It provides me a wonderful opportunity to continue the outstanding work of former head coaches and benefit from soon-to-be-created facilities at the Centre of Excellence, which I believe will lead the cricketing world in combining coaching and sports science," Cooley said.

Cooley's new responsibilities include recommendations regarding the athletes to attend the COE in 2011 and planning the COE program. He will be supported by Chappell as National Talent Manager and other senior COE Coaching staff during this time.

"CA will be working to replace Cooley as CA Pace Bowling Coach as soon as practicable after further discussions with Tim Nielsen and an assessment of current needs in this area," CA said.

The 44-year-old Cooley was a fast bowler for Tasmania in interstate competition between 1985 and 1996, following which he became the Cricket Tasmania pace bowling coach, fitness advisor and Under-17 coach.

In 2000, Cooley was given the senior coaching role at the Commonwealth Bank Cricket Academy. In 2003, he was recruited by the England and Wales Cricket Board as their fast bowling coach before returning to the Australian system in 2006 as CA pace bowling coach.