Clare Connor will step down as the ECB’s deputy chief executive officer and managing director of England Women once the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup, staged in England from 12 June to 5 July, is done and dusted.
The former England captain, who collected 111 international caps before retiring in 2006, has spent more than 18 years inside Lord’s in various off-field roles. In that time the women’s game has shifted from semi-amateur to fully professional and, whatever the wider forces at play, Connor has been front-and-centre of much of it: central contracts for England players in 2014, domestic retainers in 2020, fully fledged regional contracts two years later.
“Having fallen in love with the game in a quite different era from the one we are in now, my goals as an administrator have been firmly rooted in making cricket more equal for women and girls,” she said. “For it to be as normal for a girl to pick up a cricket bat as a boy. For a young woman to know – not just dream – that she can become a professional cricketer.
“To have played a part in removing some of the barriers that were preventing those things from being possible and to know that cricket is now a more inclusive and more gender-balanced sport, is deeply rewarding.
“Of course, a job like this is never ‘done’ but I am proud to have done my bit. This has been the job of a lifetime so deciding to leave has been an extremely hard decision. This summer’s ICC Women’s T20 World Cup feels like the right time for me to end this chapter, confident that the momentum we’ve built will carry women’s cricket forward into the bold, bright future it deserves.”
Connor’s administrative spell has not been limited to women’s cricket. In 2022-23 she held the ECB’s interim chief executive role, steering the board through a tricky period that included the release of the Independent Commission for Equity in Cricket (ICEC) report. She fronted the consultations that followed, an unglamorous but essential chunk of work aimed at tackling discrimination – racial, class-based and gendered – across the sport.
Her CV also lists the first female presidency of MCC (2021-22) and stints on both the ICC Cricket Committee and the ICC Women’s Cricket Committee, chairing the latter. A scatter of honours – MBE, OBE, CBE – underline how those in power view her contribution.
Richard Gould, the ECB’s chief executive, offered a succinct tribute. “Clare has been one of the most influential figures in cricket. Her leadership, vision and determination have transformed the game in this country and laid foundations that will benefit generations to come. Having overseen a home World Cup win in 2017, I hope that this year’s T20 World Cup on home soil can provide a fitting finale to her time at the ECB.”
England’s players will certainly hope so. They have not lifted a global trophy since that 2017 ODI success nor won the T20 version since 2009, when a Charlotte Edwards-led side triumphed, again on home turf. A fresh coaching-captaincy axis – Edwards as head coach, Nat Sciver-Brunt as captain – is already in place after the winless Ashes tour of 2025 prompted internal review, also driven by Connor.
What next for her? She hasn’t said and, frankly, she may not know yet. But after nearly two decades in corridors of power, nobody expects the 47-year-old to stray too far from cricket for too long.
