Lukies joins his mentor to lead Katty cricketers

Lukies said his priority as playing coach would be to further develop the club’s young players into stronger cricketers.

“I’ve reckon I’ve got a pretty close bond with most of them,” the pace bowler said.

“I have a lot of good banter with a lot of the young kids, and I’m excited to help them all develop.”

Lukies will lead from the front as a playing coach, working with his off-field counterpart in Allport to elevate the club’s juniors into senior playing positions.

“We’ve lost a few players and what not, so [we’ll be] developing our local young kids who are pretty handy, and seeing how we go with the challenge of competing again this year in the big time,” he said.

With Kepler Lukies and Tyler Green both likely outs, there’ll be big shoes to fill on the field.

That’s where young talents such as Archie Daniels and Oliver Maynard will be brought up to fill the gap.

“Archie Daniels played every game last year as a 15-year-old,” Lukies said.

“And he took a fair chunk of the wickets, but we might give him a role this year to play — rather than bowling randomly throughout the year, he might open.

“Ollie Maynard’s one of them. He’s been around for a few years, and he’s had a good role as an opener and whatnot.

“But I reckon this will be the year that he’s really going to step up and become a leader of the young group we have.”

Lukies was keen to get the chance to work beside his long-time mentor in Allport.

“He’s a cricketer who knows what he’s talking about,” Lukies said.

“If he tells you something, you definitely listen to what he says.”