David Graveney feared that he would pay a high price in the fallout from the Schofield Review and his concerns have proved well-founded. After 11 years in the part-time role of chairman of selectors he has been overlooked for the full-time position of national selector, which will be filled instead by Geoff Miller, a colleague on the old panel.

Miller, 55, had initially applied only for one of the two part-time posts that have gone to Ashley Giles and James Whitaker, but altered tack as soon as the ECB told him that Graveney would not be appointed. It may be little consolation to Graveney that he has been stabbed in full view by the ECB and not in the back by a friend.

Hugh Morris, the managing director of England cricket, declined to say what Miller can offer that Graveney could not. But he denied that the ECB felt under pressure to look elsewhere after criticism of giving jobs to the boys in the first wave of appointments recommended in Ken Schofield’s report into the Ashes failure of 2006-07.

Instead, Graveney will become something called “Performance Manager” with a brief of managing development of players at the 18 first-class county academies to “ensure that the most talented youngsters in England and Wales have the opportunity to become successful England cricketers”. The terminology is vague, and it sounds like a sop.

In full, the new selection panel will comprise Miller, Giles, Whitaker and Peter Moores, the head coach, whose voice may still resonate loudest at meetings. In one subtle alteration from the job specification recommended by Schofield, Miller will not be present from start to finish of all England tours abroad.

Morris said: “I think that the previous selectors have taken us forward a long way. They have given us an extremely solid and valuable base. There are some exciting objectives for the next four years, to win the Ashes and an ICC one-day event, and we feel we have an exciting team of selectors to help us do that.” Chris Adams, the Sussex captain, and Tim Boon, the Leicestershire senior coach, are among those understood to have applied for the senior role. Miller said that it took him “about three seconds” to accept the job even though it will erode the time he now has to tread the lucrative after-dinner speaking circuit.

“My speaking is part of my life,” Miller said. “I am in the entertainment business and it also gives me the chance to promote cricket and, I hope, make people laugh. Now I can be more frugal in the engagements I select.” He will not give up altogether and will monitor the situation to ensure that conflicts of interest do not arise.

He admitted that he will be under greater pressure than he felt when Graveney took the flak for any failure. “David was fantastic,” Miller said. “He did things in an exemplary manner but I will have my own views about the way the job should work both inside and outside the dressing-room.”

Asked about England’s decline since the 2005 Ashes, he preferred to think back to when he joined the panel in 2000. “The curve from there has been pretty good,” he said. “There have been a couple of backward steps, but with the experience and quality in the side, and the potential of the young players, we can get back on an even keel.”

Of the two newcomers, Giles, who retired from playing because of a hip injury only last season, will combine the task with his full-time job as the Warwickshire director of cricket. Whitaker left the game in 2005 after 22 years with Leicestershire as player, captain and administrator. He is also a former England A manager.

Dusty’s road

- Geoff Miller, an off-spinning all-rounder from Chesterfield, played 34 times for England between 1976-84
- His biggest achievement was in topping the bowling averages with 23 wickets at 15.04 during the Ashes-winning series in Australia in 1978-79
- Played county cricket for Derbyshire and Essex, retiring in 1994 with 12,027 first-class runs at 26.49 and 888 wickets at 27.98. Needed 380 innings to record his maiden hundred
- Retired in 1994 and became an England selector in 2000. Has become witty after-dinner speaker
- Nicknamed “Dusty”

Words by Richard Hobson

- Worcestershire have agreed a deal to keep Steven Davies, their highly rated wicketkeeper, at the club until the end of the 2009 season. Davies, 21, has been touted as a future England wicketkeeper and has represented his country’s under19 and A teams. Steve Rhodes, the county’s director of cricket, said: “He is one of our most talented young players and we want to secure his future with us. He is pushing hard for full international honours.”

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