In a historic development, former Australia wicketkeeper Julia Price has become the first-ever female coach of the Big Bash League (BBL). Notably, Julia has been appointed as the assistant coach of the Brisbane Heat for the forthcoming season of the Big Bash League and is all set to work along with head coach Darren Lehmann and Ryan Harris who is the bowling coach there. In addition to them, Gavin Fitness is the coaching assistant for Brisbane Heat for the ninth season.

A veteran of 107 matches for Queensland between 1993-94 and 2006-07 and 38 matches for Tasmania, Julia Price will officially join the team on 1 January night when the team will be up against Perth Scorchers at the Metricon Stadium. The same was confirmed in a statement released by the team on its official website.

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In addition to being one of the greats in the Australian domestic cricket circuit, Price has played as many as 10 Test matches for 84 ODIs for the Australian senior national team. She even played her part in her country’s 1997 and 2015 World Cup wins.

Currently, she is the head coach of the USA Women’s team, an assignment she took up after having coached Tasmania and Women’s Big Bash League side Hobart Hurricanes for the first three editions. In two of these three seasons, she was at the helm of a team that reached the semis.

“I’m pleased the Heat have been able to go in a direction that we haven’t seen yet in the BBL in having a woman on the coaching staff, but I don’t believe it will be the last time it happens either. Hopefully, this works well for ‘Pricey’ and assists her with her role with USA Cricket in the future,” said Price.

“I’m very excited at this opportunity provided to me by the Heat,” she added.

Meanwhile, Lehmann also welcomed her addition to the coaching staff.

“We’d been chatting about whether there were some professional development opportunities for her through her USA role and we just went from there,” Lehmann said.

“She has an excellent cricket brain and plenty of experience as a head coach, so I can see her fitting quite neatly into our set-up,” he added.

The ninth season of the Big Bash League will commence from 17 December 2019 with the season opener being played between the Brisbane Heat and Sydney Thunder.