England cricket chief Rob Key has responded to criticism of cycling chief Dave Brailsford's involvement in the ECB high performance review following criticism from Geoffrey Boycott.
Brailsford is one of a number of figures from outside cricket involved in the review, which is being led by former England captain Andrew Strauss. Former England rugby union World Cup winning coach Clive Woodward, Newcastle United sporting director Dan Ashworth and Manchester City performance director Simon Timson are also involved.
Boycott had questioned their involvement on the Vaughany and Tuffers Cricket Club podcast, sarcastically saying: "He'll know a lot about cricket, will David. And the guy from rugby [Woodward].
"How many ex-cricketers is Andrew talking to? Those that played on uncovered pitches and those that played the type of four-day cricket played now? How many of them is he talking to??
However, in an appearance on Sky Sports, Key explained the involvement of figures like Brailsford in the ECB's review and laughed off suggestions they could not offer any expertise due to a lack of experience within cricket.
Key said: "We ended up with all these experts in other fields like David Brailsford, who'd a huge amount of success in what he was doing and what we didn't do was say 'how do you reckon we could play a cover drive better, David? What do you reckon about people's techniques?'
"We said 'how does your system work? What are the most important priorities for your sport?' and we just listened. They were not telling us 'you need to do this in county cricket', they just said 'these are the things we think are important' and we took that away and are trying to work out with the game exactly what that means and how we can make sure we have some of those principles that mean you have a successful team.
"I thought with David Brailsford and his 'marginal gains' that he and I might not be quite on the same page but I thought he was fantastic. One of the things he spoke about was that it's not just about winning, it's actually about the style, the brand and the way you go about it and carry yourself as a team.
"There's loads of other things as well, extraordinary leadership... you see that from McCullum and Stokes and it's the same in the white ball with Mott and Jos Buttler. They were the things they spoke about you getting right.
"The other thing David Brailsford said was 'you've got to start looking at how you can help everyone else and not just what everyone can do for you' and we've taken that on board as much as we can."
