Titans place all their bets on Walter as coach

Appointing Rob Walter as head coach was a "calculated gamble", the Titans admitted yesterday.

Walter, 37, has been the Proteas' conditioning expert for six years and is the Pune Warriors' assistant coach in this year's Indian Premier League.

He has worked in the national academy, is a former director of the Pretoria University academy, holds a level-three qualification and will start a level-four course in July.

But Walter, who has signed a two-year contract with the franchise, has never coached a team at first-class level.

"It's something we had to consider, but you take a gamble with any coach," Titans CEO Jacques Faul said. "The fact that he has worked with high-quality coaches was important. It is a gamble, but it's a calculated gamble."

Did the Titans consider elevating assistant coach Malibongwe Maketa to the top job?

"You do want people to come from the inside, but they've got to be ready," Faul said. "It's such a cut-throat business - if they're not ready, you kill their career."

Titans captain Henry Davids offered a succinct opinion on the coach's role.

"You have to get to know players and know what makes them tick on the day and also in the long term, especially the small things," Davids said. "It's the players' job to win on the field; it's the coach's job to get the players to do that."

The pressure will be on Walter to fulfil that brief. The Titans are no strangers to success, and last season was only the third since the start of the franchise era in 2004-05 that they did not win a trophy.

Titans chairman Vincent Sinovich did not shy away from making clear the consequences of the team's failure under Walter.

"If they keep winning, we hope to have a [Alex] Ferguson kind of coach," Sinovich said. "Our coaches pick their own teams and they live and die by that. If they don't win, we find another coach," he warned.

The coaching job became available when Matthew Maynard opted not to renew his contract after the death of his son, Tom, last June.

Walter was on the shortlist from which Maynard was appointed in 2011. "There wasn't much difference [between them] - Matthew pipped him," Sinovich said.

Yesterday, Walter scooped the nod.

"Hugely excited to be appointed as Titans head coach, honour and privilege to be working with such a highly successful franchise," Walter tweeted two-and-a-half hours before the news became official.

Grant Flower, Craig McDermott and Richard Pybus were among the 18 other applicants for the job.

Walter is in Amsterdam preparing for the Proteas' ODI against the Netherlands next week. He could also be called for South Africa's tour to Sri Lanka in July.