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Cape Town - Proteas Test captain Faf du Plessis has some advice for likely new coach Ottis Gibson: don't make wholesale changes.
While Gibson has been heavily linked with the head coach role over the past few days without any official word coming out of Cricket South Africa (CSA), Du Plessis went a long way towards confirming the appointment when the Proteas arrived at Cape Town International on Thursday following their return from England.
"As far as we know, it's been told to us that the decision has been made by the coaching panel," the skipper confirmed.
"They've chosen Ottis Gibson as their recommendation and now that goes to the board and the board decides whether they want to use that recommendation or not."
Du Plessis added that he had "heard a few names floating around" in terms of who Gibson's assistants might be, but he did not know whether or not there was any truth to the names.
While he has accepted that Russell Domingo's time as coach is almost certainly up, Du Plessis encouraged whoever the new coach was to think twice before getting rid of Neil McKenzie (batting coach), Charl Langeveldt (bowling coach) and Claude Henderson (spin bowling coach).
"In an ideal situation, you'd like to make as little change as possible so it's not wholesale changes," said Du Plessis.
"A whole new coaching staff would come in and it would take a while to get to know everyone.
"If there was a suggestion I could make is to for whoever to come in, if it was Ottis, to come in and see for himself what the team requires.
"If he decides that there needs to be changes, then he decides that over a period of time. Our technical coaches, I think, have been doing a very good job."
Du Plessis has been asking a couple of the England players what Gibson, the current England bowling coach, is like as a coach and a person.
"For me it was important, because I don't know Ottis, to try and find something out about him," Du Plessis said openly.
"I spoke to a few of the West Indian players because he was their coach and then I spoke to the English guys about their thoughts on him.
"There were one or two differences in opinion ... the comments were positive.
"I spoke to Ben Stokes, who said he was a very good bowling coach. I spoke to Eoin Morgan from a captaincy perspective, who said he was very good and a good guy."
Du Plessis added that losing Domingpo would not be easy.
"The fact that the team knows Russell well, there are good relationships and the players trust him ... that's a good asset that the coach has. To lose that will not be nice," he said.
"But the other side is that someone will come in with some fresh ideas ... maybe it is a good time for that, maybe not.
"The relationship from me from a captain and team point of view will take time, but as long as the person you put in place is someone who understands cricket in South Africa and what our culture is all about, it should be easy to get it going."
During their time in England, the Proteas their Test, ODI and T20I series against the hosts while they were also knocked out of the ICC Champions Trophy at the group stages.
