CSB: Bentleigh names new coach, chases recruits

Bentleigh has installed a gun batter as coach and been busy chasing recruits for the 2023-24 Cricket Southern Bayside season.

Ben Seabrook will pad up again for Bentleigh next season.

Bentleigh’s new coach already has the respect of the Demons players.

Ben Seabrook plundered 615 runs, at 76, for Bentleigh last season to top the Cricket Southern Bayside runs list.

The Demons moved swiftly to secure the Englishman for another season, and then went one better by appointing him senior coach.

“He loves Bentleigh, he’s fallen in love with the country and the players,’’ Bentleigh’s previous coach Jarrad Dowling said of 24-year-old Seabrook.

Dowling cited “work and life commitments’’ for his decision to relinquish the coaching reins, but he will remain as Bentleigh captain and as a support to Seabrook.

Jarrad Dowling bowling for Bentleigh last season. Picture: Valeriu Campan

He endorsed Seabrook as “a really great fit’’ to coach the Demons.

“He’s got a good young cricket brain but an old head on his shoulders as well,’’ Dowling said.

“He will come in and give it a fresh lick of paint from my structures that I set up.

“I set it up to be a little bit more representative of what a Premier Cricket environment would look like in terms of training structure and strategy and thinking about the game…

“And now Ben will come in with a bit more technical coaching and take it to the next level of detail.

“It’s good timing and he’s the right guy.’’

Dowling said Seabrook has done a lot of coaching in the UK and Bentleigh would benefit from his expertise.

“He’s very good with technical coaching and he has a good outlook on the game,’’ Dowling said.

“We think he’s a good one to progress our existing structure and work really well with the young boys as well...with my support as well, still being there.’’

Dowling said Bentleigh was in the running to secure a couple of big name recruits.

“I’ve been recruiting pretty hard,’’ he said.

But he confirmed West Indies paceman Jermaine Levy, who took 24 wickets for Bentleigh last season, wouldn’t be returning.