Match maker
Rahul He said early on that he had no magic wand, yet magic is what he has wrought as India A and U-19 coach. How exactly did Dravid do it? Take a look at the steps that started out so small, and ended at the Gabba
He said early on that he had no magic wand, yet magic is what he has wrought as India A and U-19 coach. How exactly did Dravid do it? Take a look at the steps that started out so small, and ended at the Gabba
Five years ago, in front of aspiring engineers at Kolkata’s Jadavpur University, a man with the first hint of grey in his sideburns walked on to a manicured cricket ground. Leased to the Cricket Association of Bengal, it had a rolled pitch, a tiny 700-sq-ft clubhouse, a manual scoreboard, and three temporary shelters for electronic scorers and the local media.
It was November 2015. A 16-member India squad was preparing for the 2016 Under-19 World Cup by playing a tri-nation series with Bangladesh and Afghanistan. It was just another tournament, meant as practice for a slightly bigger tournament. But the man with a hint of grey in his sideburns and a disarming smile had other ideas. He wanted to use this squad, this tournament, and this stage, as the foundation for something much larger.
It was uncharted territory, but this man knew a thing or two about laying a foundation and erecting innings, and careers on it.
He was, after all, The Wall himself.
Six members of this squad, the first to be managed by Rahul Dravid three years after retiring as a talisman of India’s finest batting unit ever, have gone on to play for the country. Two — Rishabh Pant and Washington Sundar — are now part of cricketing lore.
On January 19, at the Gabba — the iconic field in Brisbane where Australia had not lost in 32 years — an India team made up largely of rookies (Pant and Sundar included) chased down an improbable total to win the Test and tour. Who were these relative rookies, and how did they get there?
The new normal
Generally, the steps to a career in Indian cricket are gradual and well-defined — a player starts playing divisional club cricket or in the academies, gets selected for the state age-group teams through trials, plays more cricket before signing up for the U-19 trials or takes the more circuitous and fairly laborious route of playing firstclass cricket until their performance is noticed by a zonal selector.
An Under-19 team berth is like an early pass — do well there and the senior selectors will keep checking on you for at least the next two years. The system worked to a degree. Some outstanding players came through (like Virat Kohli, who led India to victory in the 2008 U-19 World Cup). But there were those that fell through the cracks; languishing at a time when they needed guidance the most.
As the new coach, Dravid decided to make a farsighted change. Instead of focusing only on sure shots, he created a process of building an enviable bench for the senior team, a secondstring of young but supremely capable players waiting to grab their chance. Winning U-19 tournaments became secondary, unearthing talent and keeping it on track became all-important.
Pant, Sundar, Prithvi Shaw, Shubman Gill, Shardul Thakur and Hanuma Vihari — all of whom played in the Australia series — all came up through Dravid’s system. If there was a starting point to this quiet change, it was that November in 2015, five months after Dravid became the U-19 and India ‘A’ coach.
The mentor
Dravid, then 42, told the team he had no magic wand to ensure every player made it to the next level, but he could offer them another route. “Every two years there are 15 or 16 new U-19 players coming up. But there won’t be 15 or 16 slots in the Indian team every two years,” he said in a rare press interaction on the sidelines of that 2015 tri-nation series. “If [Cheteshwar] Pujara, [Virat] Kohli and [Ajinkya] Rahane keep scoring runs, tough luck for a lot of guys. That’s the way it works... Only two or three guys will make it from here and the rest should aim to have really good successful first-class careers.”
What Dravid did ensure was that every youngster with skill and commitment got a fair shot. Under his supervision, skills and perseverance are given equal importance. Data is used to support coaching instincts.
Dravid also demands absolute professionalism and dedication to the team’s cause, said former Saurashtra batting stalwart Sitanshu Kotak, who was coach of the India ‘A’ team under Dravid’s supervision. “The one thing he dislikes is if anyone takes a tour for granted.”
Almost every coach HT spoke to swore by the workload management model in place at the National Cricket Academy (NCA; Dravid was named its head in 2019), which is where U-19, ‘A’ team and senior team cricketers get assessed, and by Dravid’s scientific approach.
“Say a young bowler arrives at the camp. The first thing he does is undergo a battery of tests and fitness checks after which every coach gets a separate report,” said former India pacer Subroto Banerjee, who worked as bowling coach under Dravid. “A coach must know the extent to which a cricketer can physically take in the changes he wants. Accordingly, the trainer needs to be alerted about strengthening certain elements. Nothing very big, but the attention to detail increased after Dravid joined.”
The communicator
At the core of Dravid’s approach was better communication; strange given how he wasn’t always hailed for his glibness off the field.
For example, when India went into lockdown in March, he brought together about 15 coaches from Indian cricket’s various teams for a twohour Zoom call every Friday, to brainstorm over how to proceed and to evaluate progress. At these meetings were India bowling coach Bharat Arun, fielding coach R Sridhar, women’s coach WV Raman, U-19 coach Paras Mhambrey and NCA coaches.
Also important is the personal touch. India paceman Khaleel Ahmed remembers a time during the 2016 U-19 World Cup when he started doubting himself. “One day, during nets, Rahul Sir came and told me, ‘you don’t become a good or bad player because of one match or one tournament. Never doubt yourself.’ That boosted my confidence from zero to 100,” he said. “I still remember those words.”
Abhay Sharma, who was fielding coach with the U-19 team, recalls how the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) readily agreed to the management’s request to double the dearness allowance in 2016, after it was found that some players were compromising on their diet for want of money. “That was a very good call,” Sharma said. “These are small things which matter a lot. Players also got better hotels, physio training facilities. They were told ‘you will be looked after nicely’. Rahul Dravid would go and eat with them too. The development process started to change from here.”
Dravid is now head of cricket at the NCA, but the message hasn’t changed at the Under-19 level. “He would tell every player ‘As long as I am here, you won’t have to worry about selection. If you’re not succeeding, enjoy your team’s success. You are part of it. At the end of the day a team won’,” said Banerjee. “This allowed the boys to play without any fear and keep learning. He is always available for a conversation with any player at any time. He would attend every meeting, give you the freedom to work and take updates from every coach. These are the things that make Rahul Dravid different.”
So, yes, it was a confluence of factors, many with low probabilities, that helped some of Brisbane’s winning 11 make the team — but they were ready for it. Their foundation was strong. And The Wall was watching.
(With input from Sanjjeev K Samyal)
to HT sports editor Rudraneil Sengupta and writer Aditya Iyer discuss the miracle at Brisbane.