Key, one of Flintoff’s closest friends in the game, was instrumental in his return to the public eye after he suffered horrific facial injuries while filming an episode of Top Gear in December 2022.
Flintoff was offered an unpaid role in England’s white-ball set-up during last year’s series against New Zealand, during which time the extent of his injuries became apparent, and he went on to be a mentor for the England Lions set-up prior to his unveiling as the new head coach of Northern Superchargers for this year’s Hundred.
Speaking to The Telegraph, Key confirmed that Flintoff has also been added to England’s back-room staff for their T20 World Cup campaign in the Caribbean in June – his most significant involvement with the squad yet – as Jos Buttler’s men seek to defend the title that they won in Australia two years ago.
“Without question, I think he would be an excellent head coach,” Key told the newspaper. “Who knows where he ends up in the future. He will be a worthy candidate going forward. When that time comes and whoever is in this job, and it might be outside of my time, they would be stupid not to look at him.”
In his opinion, Flintoff’s struggles – both since his accident and in the wake of his own playing career, which was cut short by a knee injury – have armed him with an “emotional intelligence” that players value when dealing with the pressures of high-level sport.
“Flintoff is a leader like [Ben] Stokes,” Key said. “Just having someone who knows what it is like to struggle and come out the other end is so relatable to those players. When they have had a bad day he can explain it. He is one of those people when he talks to you he is working you out.
“He has high emotional intelligence so he understands when you need a bit of an arm around your shoulder or blunt honesty. Those are the skills that make a great leader. Leadership is about making the people around you feel better and he is someone who is like that. He has a lot to offer.”
Flintoff’s England role will extend into the four-match T20I series against Pakistan that precedes the T20 World Cup – whereupon the squad’s return to St Lucia will revive memories of the infamous Pedalo incident that came to characterise England’s ill-starred campaign at the 2007 50-over World Cup.
But even that episode, in Key’s opinion, counts as valuable experience as Flintoff moves further into his coaching career, and he hopes that other prominent recent players, such as Moeen Ali and Eoin Morgan, can be similarly fast-tracked back into the professional set-up after their playing days.
“If you could design the perfect head coach development programme, Flintoff is going on a brilliant journey,” he said. “He started off as a mentor helping out, then a bit of Lions cricket, the under-19s and he is going to be a head coach of a team with a draft, working out how you assemble a squad and get them all playing together quickly.
“That is relevant experience much more than sitting on a Zoom call listening to someone tell you what to do. Moeen Ali I think will be an excellent coach, there are so many people. They have these skills and we want to try to create experiences where they can really learn.”
