The former Knights fast bowler Quinton Friend has been appointed as the new head coach of the Dolphins cricket team.

Friend (42) has been in the coaching setup at the Dolphins for the past five years where he served as the bowling coach and as an assistant coach. He takes over the role from Imraan Khan who had left the franchise to take up the batting leads role at Cricket South Africa’s High-Performance Centre in Pretoria.

Friend told OFM Sport that he has always dreamt of coaching at this level.

“Firstly, I’m over the moon, you know, it was a big dream of mine to coach at this level,” said Friend.

“I’m super excited and obviously honoured to be in this position. I’m just looking forward to the season, you know, it’s been a hard preseason. The guys have worked exceptionally hard and worked well, we’re in a pretty good space as a team.

“I think we’ve had some real good success over the last five years. And may that continue. I just think we have a really good bunch of guys in the squad. We all want to achieve the same goals.

Quinton Friend. Picture: Gallo

“And at the end of the day, as a head coach, you always want to make sure that your environment from a management point of view and a squad point of view is in a good and healthy space.

“We want to win trophies. But again, there’s a process you need to follow to be able to do that. We’re on the right track and yeah, just looking forward to the journey that lies ahead, and may there be plenty of memories made in my tenure.”

The Dolphins will host the ITEC Knights next week on Tuesday and Wednesday in two preseason warm-up games in Durban.

OFM Sport/Morgan Piek cg/mvh