By Charles Randall

13 October 2014

The appointment of the former Teddington CC captain Tom Harrison as the ECB chief executive seems to reinforce the strengthening relationship between the national authorities and the recreational game.

David Collier went a long way towards improving respect and trust during his 10-year term at the ECB, and it is appropriate that he is due to become the Club Cricket Conference president for 2015, the centenary year.

Harrison, 42, a former Derbyshire and Northamptonshire batsman, joined the ECB from the international sports marketing agency IMG, where he was head of cricket and responsible for the IMG Media business in the UK and Ireland across all sports and all platforms. He worked with cricket boards around the world overseeing global media rights sales for Cricket Australia, Cricket South Africa and the IPL. Early in his administrative career he worked for ECB marketing for four years.

Part of his remit will be the progress of the National Cricket Conference, a new voice in recreational cricket  working with the ECB to increase player numbers and to identify groups such as ethnic minority leagues who might need mainstream support. A target is to build reliable data on the number of current cricketers in England and Wales, as required by Sport England, through the delivery of a fixture, ground share and player-club information exchange. This is due to be launched in the first quarter of 2015.

Simon Prodger, the National Cricket Conference managing director, welcomed the appointment of Harrison, who is due to start at Lord's in January. “We hope that Tom, with his background, can carry on the good work started by David Collier – and we're confident he will,” he said. “Relationships between the ECB and clubs have possibly never been better and more constructive, although it is widely acknowledged that there are significant challenges in the recreational game.”

The ECB chairman Giles Clarke described Harrison as a leader with charisma and vision. He said: “Tom has come through a rigorous recruitment process which included us meeting with candidates in leadership positions from cricket, other sports and from outside of the industry. He was the unanimous choice of the interview panel, who were impressed with his energy, passion for the game and his positive, bold, creative and ambitious vision for the future of cricket in England and Wales.”

Collier, a former player at Colchester & East Essex CC, introduced a broad approach, emphasising the ECB's responsibilities to the grassroots sector. Rumours circulated in 2014 that some counties disagreed profoundly with the ECB's distribution of money to the professional game and the bidding process for hosting international matches, but the proportion of funding in the professional and amateur game has always been a conundrum.

Harrison, a former pupil at Oundle School, enjoyed a career in club cricket that most players could only dream about. He helped rank outsiders Manchester University to the 1994 UAU final, an amazing achievement in itself before losing to Durham's elite team. With Teddington he reached the National Club final in 1999, losing to Wolverhampton at Lord's. He captained the club to the Middlesex County League title in 2002 and reached the Evening Standard Trophy final at the Oval, though hopes of a high-quality double that year were spoilt by High Wycombe. The following season he took Teddington to another long National cup run, ending at the semi-finals.