Grace Hayden talks about life with cricketer dad Matthew and her new job with Racing X

Growing up, sport was all Grace Hayden knew — playing it and watching her cricketer dad Matthew excel on the pitch. Now she’s ready to shine in her own arena.

Matthew and Kellie Hayden at the races with their daughter Grace Hayden for the 2022 Cox Plate. Picture: Supplied

Some of Grace Hayden’s earliest memories are of watching her dad play cricket for Australia.

Now the 22-year-old daughter of Aussie great Matthew Hayden is making her own mark in sport.

“All of the iconic sporting cricket grounds were kind of my playground growing up, so it was all I ever knew,” Hayden told The Daily Telegraph.

“Sport is everything that I’ve known my whole life.

“Now that I am working in sport and cricket, I realise just how amazing my dad was, still is, but was at his craft, and I just didn’t appreciate that when I was little.

“Now I look back at videos and see he was amazing.”

Grace Hayden has landed a new gig as a presenter for international Hong Kong-based digital platform Racing X. Picture: Supplied

Hayden has been working hard to establish herself as a sports presenter over the past couple of years, covering the Indian Premier League among other events here and abroad.

She has now landed a new gig as the lead presenter for international Hong Kong-based digital platform, Racing X, and will travel the globe covering different sporting events from Saudi Arabia to New Zealand and Las Vegas.

Five-year-old Grace getting some tips from her dad on how to throw a cricket ball.

Grace and Matthew Hayden at the SCG in 2005. Picture: Mark Evans

“It is pretty much all sports,” she said.

“Dad is always super proud of me in everything I do.

“We’ve loved working together over in the cricket space and I am going to continue to do that with the IPL coming up.

“He is proud and knows I will do the family well.

“His advice has been to have fun and be myself, to shine in my own way.”

Matthew Hayden is one of the greatest opening batsmen in test history, and played during the last golden era of Australian cricket in the early 2000s.

Grace and Matthew Hayden have enjoyed working together. Picture: Adam Head

Grace, the eldest of three children to the former cricketer, is an avid sports fan and competed in everything from triathlon to javelin when she was growing up.

“I was the most competitive out of all of us kids,” she said.

“I have always loved my sport.

“Everything I do, I want to do it at 110 per cent.

“I just love being active, moving, you feel good.”

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