The Dutch governing body (KNCB) has announced the appointment of 53-year-old Maarten Westermann as its new Director. The appointment takes effect immediately.

The appointment is part of the restructuring of the KNCB which was agreed at a general meeting in June, following the report of a three-man expert committee. It is effectively a new post, reflecting an important shift of emphasis within the organisation.

Westermann’s directorial role will focus on the improvement of the Bond’s service to clubs, players, and other ‘stakeholders’, such as sponsors and the media. In announcing the appointment, the Bond makes clear that his tasks will include ‘the growth and the profile of cricket in The Netherlands’, and that he will be expected to produce ‘concrete results in the field of sponsorship and marketing’.

His background as a journalist with a particular interest in sponsorship makes him unusually well qualified to tackle the latter area, where the KNCB is in urgent need of an improved performance. Although his sporting interests have tended to centre on hockey rather than cricket, he has edited the Dutch-language journal Sponsoring, and published a number of books on the subject.

With the new Chairman of the KNCB, Marc Asselbergs, currently assembling his team in the form of a restyled Board, the key elements are now in place for the implementation of the committee’s recommendations.

It is increasingly clear that the ICC’s plans for the development of Associates’ cricket are making new demands on national organisations at every level, and that the KNCB will be unable to achieve its on-field goals without a significant increase in revenue. Followers of Dutch cricket will therefore be watching keenly as the new structure is brought into being.