Yorkshire Women have appointed former all-rounder Richard Pyrah as their new head coach.

The 41-year-old spent 10 years playing for Yorkshire and took 296 wickets across all formats of the game.

He went on to work as their bowling coach and coached Yorkshire Women’s Super League Twenty20 team before being sacked in 2021 amid the county’s racism scandal.

Pyrah later won a claim of unfair dismissal against the club but was fined £2,500 and banned from coaching for two weeks by the Cricket Discipline Commission in May 2023.

“It’s an incredible honour for me to be given the opportunity to lead Yorkshire’s women side and it’s the proudest moment of my career,” Pyrah, who will take up his new role next month, told the club website., external

“This is an exciting time to be involved in women’s cricket, following the ECB’s restructure of the women’s professional game.”

Yorkshire Women will join Derbyshire, Glamorgan, Gloucestershire, Kent, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Middlesex, Sussex and Worcestershire in Tier 2 next season, with the 10 counties playing 50-over and 20-over cricket.

Yorkshire will then become a Tier 1 club for the 2026 season.