Chris Adams, the former England batsman, has been appointed manager of Cricket Ireland’s National Academy.Adams, 45, who played county cricket for Derbyshire and Sussex – helping bring regular silverware to the latter – and has since had coaching roles with Sri Lanka and Netherlands after a spell as Surrey coach will take up his role at the Shapoorji Pallonji National Academy in June. He replaces Australian Craig Hogan who is returning home.”I am really looking forward to starting in my new role,” Adams said. “It’s a fantastic opportunity to work with Ireland’s emerging talent, and I hope my experience and knowledge will help all the players and academy coaching staff achieve their potential.”The goal will most definitely be to ensure that Ireland head coach John Bracewell has the very best talent supply over the next few years, to ensure we remain on course to be competitive across all three forms of the game at the highest level.”The appointment of Adams was welcomed by Cricket Ireland Performance Director Richard Holdsworth who said: “We are very pleased to secure the services of Chris. We see him as an integral part of overseeing the development of our most talented young players and those on the fringes of the national team over the coming years.”We are now looking to develop our talent into world class players who are capable of performing against the best in the world in all three formats.”With Chris’ experience of coaching internationally, not to mention as a player in the Test arena with England, he will bring great understanding of what it takes to perform at the highest level.”Our one-day international fixture list is increasing all the time, and with more multi-day and T20 cricket in the pipeline, we need to ensure we have young players who are challenging the established senior players for places and ready to compete on the world stage.”