Moonee Valley appoints our new coach

Moonee Valley Cricket Club has appointed New Zealander Sakthi (Shak) Prasad as our new coach, and we welcome him to our club.
Shak was appointed after last season's coach Brayden McGregor stood down due to work commitments. Brayden continues as a player.
Shak holds a Level 3 ICC coaching qualification as well as Level 1 and 2 Australian coaching certificates. As well as coaching our senior teams, he is keen to have a close involvement with our junior program.
Here's his first message to our club:
Hi everyone, it’s great to be joining the club and I’m looking forward to meeting you all soon.
Cricket is my passion and I’ve played my whole life beginning in Chennai India, where I used a piece of wood and a rubber ball for street cricket. I just wanted to play.
I took the coaching side more seriously when I did my Australia Level 1 and 2 around 2018 and was invited to Dubai to complete my ICC Level 3 in 2019. I am also a NZ cricket umpire. Continuing to learn and update my skills is really important to me as it will benefit players.
I’ve been based in New Zealand for the past 5 years, where I set up my own coaching business. One student was picked up for the under 19’s international Samoan team and others have been fast tracked into the Cricket Wellington Pathway Program.
I bring an holistic approach to my coaching as I believe that technical ability and mindset go together. I have a Masters in Social Work and a Degree in Drug and Alcohol Studies and these complement the on-field components.
I bring experience coaching men and women in both a team and one on one format and love to see players having fun and being stretched to reach their peak performance.  My coaching style is very calm and casual and my experience enables me to quickly see how to make player improvements.
My expectation is to see everyone enjoy the game and use me to help enhance individual and team capability across the club. Also, training smarter is something that I hope everyone will be on board with and making sure that everyone is aware that they can just come and have a chat with me anytime.
From a training perspective I want ensure everyone is clear on our goals and have an open forum where you can be heard, and know that your individual talent will be recognised when you play.
A little about me - everyone calls me Shak, I love what I do, am a team player, very social, into fitness, and I love to score runs and take wickets (44 was my highest recently in a season). Being a great role model is important to me and as I want to keep cricket alive and thriving.