UAE board to take a call on coach for USA tour with Robin Singh committed to IPL duty

New director of cricket will be with Mumbai Indians in April, as part of his existing commitments

New UAE director of cricket Robin Singh, third from left, with members of the Emirates Cricket Board. Courtesy Robin Singh / Twitter

The Emirates Cricket Board are unclear who will coach them on their next assignment, on tour to United States in April, but say they are confident they will “figure it out”.

The UAE will play the next leg of Cricket World Cup League Two against United States and Scotland in Florida at the start of April.

Robin Singh, the newly-appointed performance director for UAE cricket, will be absent, though.

The series clashes with the Indian Premier League. Singh is the batting coach of the Mumbai Indians. He is retaining that job, despite his new role with the UAE.

Dougie Brown has been sacked as the national team head coach, while his assistant, Dom Telo, also left UAE cricket at the end of the Under 19 World Cup in South Africa this month.

Mubashir Usmani, the ECB’s general secretary, says it is unclear who will fill the breach for the Florida tour – but is confident the situation will not re-occur in the future.

“We are still trying to figure it out,” Mubashir said.

“Robin has said we will come up with a solution for it. He was not part of UAE cricket when this USA series was planned.

“We will sit down – Robin and I – and try to make the [Future Tours Programme] in future in such a way that is doesn’t clash with the programme of IPL.

“We want him to be part of the IPL Mumbai Indians team, because we feel that gives us more opportunity to explore.

“Regarding this series that is coming up at the same time as IPL, we will definitely figure out what will be best for UAE cricket.”

Singh has also held roles with a number of other franchise teams around the world.

He said that he is giving up “most” of them, except for the IPL job with the Mumbai Indians, in order to focus on UAE cricket.

In terms of the CWCL2, UAE are not scheduled to play a series during the traditional window for the IPL – April to May – in 2021.

Singh believes there will be benefits to UAE cricket in him dovetailing his new job with IPL duties.

To date, just one UAE player has been involved in the IPL. Chirag Suri was part of the Gujarat Lions squad in 2017.

Singh said he has already spoken to the Mumbai Indians to see how UAE cricket can benefit from his involvement with the franchise.

“I have given up most of the other commitments I have,” Singh said of his various franchise jobs.

“The only other commitment which I had spoken about before I took on this role was IPL, which we think is beneficial for UAE cricket.

“The whole idea for doing that is to see how we can engage UAE cricket, sort of integrate with the IPL team I am involved with, and with the experiences that I have had over the years.

“I have already been in contact with them, to see if we can do something together.”