MEET THE COACHES
JAMES KNOTT
Having come through the junior ranks at Kent, James played professional cricket for MCC Young Cricketers, Surrey & Somerset for eight years between 1994 & 2001, making 24 appearance for Surrey’s 1st XI. Following on from that he played nine years of minor counties cricket for Bedfordshire, captaining for three of those. He made several appearances for the representative Minor Counties XI and also the ECB XI (England Amateurs) that won the European Championships in 2004.
As a coach James is level III qualified and has been the Director of Cricket at Stowe School since 2004, finishing top of the national school’s cricket league twice, winning the Schools Arch Trophy twice and finishing runners up of the National T20 twice. Several pupils have gone on to play professional cricket in that time – Liam Gough (MCC YC & Essex), Mark Nelson (Northants), Graeme White (Northants, Notts & England Lions), Ben Howgego (Northants), with the most high-profile being Ben Duckett (Northants, Notts & England Test, ODI & T20i). Several others have gone onto MCCU programmes at Loughborough, Cambridge, Oxford & Durham, as well as to play minor counties cricket. A current pupil at the school – James Cronie – is on the Northants Academy and represented the Midlands at the Bunbury Festival and the Super 4’s and is currently training with the England u19s squad.
ANDY O’CONNOR
Andy came through the junior system at Northants, playing for both the Academy and Second XI. The remainder of his 25 year playing career consisted of playing in the Birmingham League, and predominantly the Northamptonshire Premier League, also representing the county in the Northants Amateur League XI.
Whilst playing local league cricket, Andy pursued a 25 year career in Civil Engineering, working as a Design Engineer for Civil Engineering Consultants, before making the switch to cricket coaching.
Andy is an ECB Level 3 coach (2006) and is also a member of the Northamptonshire ECB Coach Education team. He is part of the junior coaching setup at Northants, having coached most age groups, both boys and girls. He is currently Coach of the new U18s boy’s squad, having coached the u17s Boys team during their ECB National Championship 3 day and 1 day cup winning seasons of 2017 and 2019. Andy was head coach of the Northants Women’s squad, the “Steelettos”, for 8 seasons, and also headed up the Northants Girls Emerging Players Programme (EPP), whilst also working on the boys Academy and EPP Coaching teams. He was also head coach at the Moulton College Cricket Academy for 5 years, one of the students being Olly Stone (Northants, Warwickshire, & England); with others moving on to MCCU cricket.
Andy has been a coach at Stowe School for the past five years, seeing some cricketer’s progress to MCCU and County 2nd XI cricket. In 2010 Andy was voted National Chance to Shine MCC Spirit of Cricket Coach of the Year.
James Mellor
James joined Northants Recreational Cricket as a Community Cricket coach at the age of 22. His roles were to coach Primary and Secondary schools around Northamptonshire and to create links with the schools and local cricket clubs. He has been coaching a County Age group for 14 years ranging from U10’s to U15’s and is currently the U15 County coach. James Mellor is a level III and has also worked with the county’s EPP and Academy players. James also coaches on a part time basis at Stowe School.
jonny cater
Jonny has played for a number of representative sides over his career. This started at the age of 10 where he became an integral part of the Buckinghamshire age group sides. He represented the South of England at Junior level and went on to make his minor counties debut at the age of 17. He was selected for the British Universities whilst studying for his degree in Southampton. Jonny currently captains Oxfordshire CCC in the minor counties championship and has been in the role for 4 years.
As a coach, Jonny is level 2.5 qualified and has vast experience across both group and individual settings. He is a fully qualified teacher, completing his PGCE 9 years ago. Since then, he has worked in a range of education settings including a short period at Stowe where he coached all ages and abilities.
Ben Coddington
Ben is part of Northamptonshire’s 2nd XI having progressed through their junior age-group pathway after making the switch from Leicestershire CCC. Recently Ben has also represented Bedfordshire and Lincolnshire in Minor Counties cricket as well as playing at MCCU and 1st XI level during his time at Loughborough University. Ben also has playing and coaching experience overseas, spending a winter in Australia, which greatly aided his coaching development. He currently plays his club cricket up in the ECB Lincolnshire Premier League for Grantham CC.
Ben has a wealth of coaching experience which has seen him work in a number of different environments both in the UK (with Northants & Derbyshire CCC’s) and abroad. On a placement year Ben joined Stowe School, working alongside James and Andy in delivering the school’s cricket programme to the pupils. Prior to this, Ben has also had short coaching stints abroad in the UAE, India and Australia to name a few, all of which have helped to broaden his knowledge and understanding of the game.
SPECIALIST GUEST COACH:
GRAEME WHITE
As a left arm spinner and lower middle order batsman, Graeme White has had a 15 year professional career with Northants & Nottinghamshire. This has included winners medals in the T20 Blast and a call up for England Lions tours. Graeme now coaches during the off season. He is a level III coach and has started his level IV certification.
SPECIALIST GUEST COACH:
BEN DUCKETT
Ben Duckett’s youth cricket career saw him play as a batsman/wicket keeper for Northamptonshire CCC and Stowe School. Once signing professionally, Ben kept less regularly and began to focus more on his batting. He had incredible success early in his career with 2016 being his best season to date. That year he scored over 1,300 first class runs and won the T20 Blast with Northants. This led to him being named as young cricketer of the year by both the Cricket Writers' Club and the Professional Cricketers' Association (PCA). He was also named PCA Player of the Year - the first player to win both PCA awards in the same season. To date Ben has played 4 Test Matches, 3 ODI’s and 1 T20i for England.
SPECIALIST GUEST COACH:
david ripley
David Ripley played for Northamptonshire from 1984-2001. He took 678 catches and 85 stumpings. In his 307 first-class games he scored 8693 runs at 28.40 with nine centuries.
Ripley was appointed vice-captain of Northamptonshire in 1999 and became captain in his final season, replacing Matthew Hayden. In 1998 he put on 401 for the fifth wicket with Mal Loye against Glamorgan. To date they are the only Northamptonshire pair to ever put on 400 runs. His most prolific year with the gloves came in 1988 with 81 dismissals. In the same year he took six dismissals in an innings against Sussex.
Ripley is currently the first team coach at Northamptonshire and Assistant coach for the London Spirit. In 2013, Ripley led Northants to promotion from County Championship Division 2 and the Friends Life T20. In 2016, Ripley led the County to a second NatWest T20 Blast success.
SPECIALIST GUEST COACH: chris liddle
Christopher John Liddle is a left arm seamer who started his career with Leicestershire in 2005. He moved to Sussex for the 2007 season. He mainly represented Sussex in limited overs cricket, taking a career best 5/17 against Middlesex in the T20 Blast. In early 2013 he also played for Dhaka Gladiators in the Bangladesh Premier League.
After finishing his playing career with Gloucestershire Liddle is now the Assistant Head Coach at Northants County Cricket Club.