Chris Rogers has been appointed head coach of Victoria with the former Test opener vowing to turn more players from the state into permanent members of the Australian team. A prolific run-scorer at both state and English county level, Rogers played 25 Tests before gaining experience with assistant coaching roles at Gloucestershire and Somerset. He joined Cricket Australia’s High Performance team in early 2018 and acted as head coach of the Australian under-19 team at the World Cup earlier this year.

One of his main missions will be getting more Victorians playing at national level.

That includes working with young right-hander Will Pucovski, who was on the cusp of making his Test debut last year until mental health issues sidelined him.

“It’s about finding out what he thinks he needs to do to take the next step and finding ways to support that,” Rogers, nicknamed ‘Buck’ by teammates, said on Wednesday.

Others he is keen to see playing for Australia again include attacking batsman Nic Maddinson and opener Marcus Harris, who was dropped from the Test squad a year ago after nine appearances.

Promoted

“I think I can offer a lot of them something, but in particular when it comes to opening batsmen who are trying to force their way into the Australian side, not just force their way in then hold their spot, be successful,” he said.

Rogers takes over from Andrew McDonald, who is now an assistant coach with the national team under Justin Langer.