Michael Delaney and Jono Dean join Cricket ACT in high performance roles

The Canberra cricket stalwarts have joined Cricket ACT's ranks - Delaney as male pathway and talent manager, and Dean as ACT Meteors assistant and high performance coach.

Delaney has taken the reins of a role designed to build and manage elite underage male pathways and improving the identification of potential elite cricketers.

Dean will rejoin the ACT Meteors in an assistant coaching role and help to develop coaching programs across senior and emerging pathways, and developing identified coaches along pathway as a high performance coach.

Delaney's appointment comes after he transformed the Ginninderra Tigers from also-rans into Douglas Cup winners last season.

The Ginninderra mentor will be "a voice for ACT" at the selection table as the governing body sets its sights on breeding more players worthy of domestic and national contracts.

Nine players on state or Cricket Australia contracts have played club cricket in Canberra including Ashes-bound spinner Nathan Lyon, Jason Behrendorff, Tom Rogers and Nick Winter.

"I think if you look at how many contracted players we've got at the moment that have come out of the ACT programs, we are in a pretty good space," Delaney said.

"But from our point of view, we're really looking to try and improve that every year. So yes we've done well in the past, and yes we've got some great cricketers to come out of Canberra.

"We've got two players playing in the World Cup that came through our program. But we're always looking to improve this year.

"The standard of cricket in the ACT is slowly improving and I think if we keep pushing in the right direction we'll be in a good space in the next few years."

Dean will play a key role in the Meteors' bid to break NSW's stranglehold on the WNCL title in what could be an extended campaign.

The Weston Creek Molonglo batsman is determined to unearth the next hidden gem in Canberra as the Meteors forge stronger links with the ACT competition.

"You've seen with the women's game of late, it's growth is exponential," Dean said.

"There is a definite pathway there now for young women, girls coming through from grassroots and young women coming through if they want to play cricket.

"The Meteors have done some fantastic things over the years, as a bunch of really talented women involved in that program and our goal is to keep producing good people and good cricketers through those programs.

"We've always had a really good pool of talent. We've put in some really good structures now to manage that talent and to help that talent develop."