Under Malan as coach, Ireland have come together as a stronger all-round unit ©Getty
In Irish sport, few personalities garner as much intrigue as the gaffer. Andy Farrell, the affable Wigan lad who serves as the head coach of the hugely successful men's rugby team, is revered. In soccer, the death of Jack Charlton, Ireland's manager during their successful 1990 World Cup run, prompted widespread mourning. In more recent times, the ongoing search for a head coach of the men's football team, now stretching into a seventh month, is a national embarrassment.
Cricket, with the heightened importance of the captain, doesn't lend itself as much to the cult of personality of the head coach. Yet in Irish circles, the identity of the man in charge of the nation's cricketers still prompts its fair share of discussion.
Irish cricket is small, constantly battling for attention at home and respect abroad. As a nascent professional game built on amateur club structures which have to be gently coerced into modernisation, the sport lends itself to suspicion of those hailing from outside what is a unique system. Some fare better than others at building that public trust.
Heinrich Malan, the former first-class cricketer in his native South Africa who subsequently cut his coaching cloth in New Zealand's domestic structure, is still a relative unknown to the public two years into his tenure as Ireland's head coach. Success, though, helps bridge all divides. A good
