CLARKE PLANS FOR LIFE AFTER CRICKET Warwickshire all-rounder Rikki Clarke has started planning for life after cricket having returned from two weeks of work experience with a land investment company in Dubai. The 34 year-old former England international worked for Herald Land, where his father Bob is managing director, in the heart of Dubai’s business district which gave Clarke a valuable insight into a potential future career. ” It was enjoyable but a bit of an eye-opener,” Clarke said. ” I was out of my comfort zone a hell of a lot, putting on a suit and tie and going into an office every day. ” All I have ever known from a young age is cricket, but it’s about planning for the future. I have a wife and two kids. I have two years left on my contract and, if my fitness and performance hold up, I might be able to get another two years after that. ” But I will be 36 at the end of my current contract so I still have almost 30 years of my working life ahead of me. ” During the two weeks with Herald Land I shadowed departments, shadowed Dad, sat in a few meetings with clients and training sessions with some of the new guys just to get a general gist of things and how they work. ” I guess the plan would be to go out for a bit longer next winter, and as time goes on I will stay out longer and longer, and hopefully to go out there and work full time and live out there when I have finished playing.” Clarke began planning for life after cricket after a session organised by the Professional Cricketers’ Association’s Personal Development and Welfare team with recruitment agency add-victor. ” I really started looking at personal development after add-victor came in to see us,” Clarke said. ” I thought it was quite scary. Some cricketers have been to university and got degrees and done this done that. But all I had ever known was cricket. I was adamant when I was a youngster that I was going to play cricketer and I was going to give everything to that. ” I didn’t neglect the education side of things but it was a bit of an afterthought. So when add-victor said: if you want to go into this job you would need these qualifications and it would take about three years at university to get them, I wondered how on earth am I going to fit this in with my cricket? ” Then there was the financial aspect. I thought it was a lot of work for the amount of money that add-victor had listed for the different careers. Sometimes you take it for granted what you get paid as a cricketer. If you do it well, you get paid well. ” But it made me think about what I needed to do to make sure when I have to make the transition out of cricket that I am in the best possible place to say that I can take a job at X amount of money because I have set this aside and done things the right way. ” With Dad then saying he potentially wanted me to take over the business in a few years’ time, has helped me out massively.” Clarke may have come to personal development late in the day but he is among 82 per cent of the professional cricketers in England and Wales who now have a personal development plan alongside playing. ” The biggest regret in my career is that I haven’t done this sooner. We have a couple of lads in our dressing room, Oliver Hannon-Dalby and Richard Jones in particular, who are still young in cricketing terms but, blimey, they have things planned ready for the future. I wish I had been one of those guys when I was 25, 26 and 27, getting things in place. ” I have no doubt that people like Ollie and Richard if, God forbid, something happened to them tomorrow and their careers were over, they would be in a good place to go into other things. ” That wasn’t me but it is me now. I have landed on my feet a little bit and maybe got out of jail a little bit because I should have started my personal development sooner. But there are guys out there who are already planning for their future and I applaud them for it. Clarke will be back in Dubai next month but this time as a player having been signed up to play in the inaugural Masters Champions League, a tournament for former international players. Clarke will play for the Capricorn Commanders alongside his Warwickshire team mate Jeetan Patel while Jonathan Trott, the Warwickshire and former England batsman, will play for the Sagittarius Soldiers. {{ak_sharing}}
