Advance Planning for Ranji Trophy

Coach moves over
Sanath Kumar, no known name to India’s millions but a bulwark of the cricket coaching fraternity in Bengaluru will coach Baroda’s Ranji Trophy team in the coming season. Of course nobody frets when a master coach at this level or any other leaves his native land if only for a two-year term. It’s a professional world.

Some of the oldies are of course a little amused with this massive change in domestic cricket culture in India. Two decades ago, moves like this would have been frowned upon.

Stellar Coaches
Karnataka’s first iconic coach in recent times was K Raghunath who ensured his boys returned to winning ways after 13 long years and ushered in the golden age for Karnataka cricket. First Roger Binny successfully broke the drought in the championship of ’95-’96 when Karnataka beat the team they most love to in the finals, Tamil Nadu.

‘Raghu’ took over the following year, not successful for the side but during the next two years wrested superb championship wins, that is, ’97-’98 and ’98-’99. No doubt the boys deserved the kudos too, no less Vijay Bharadwaj who spun his side to victory in a game lost beyond all doubt!
Terminology

Raghu and Binny were styled ‘managers’ of course because the term coach had not become fashionable for cricket teams. To clarify, they were not administrative mangers. Of course in England the football team’s coach is still called the manager, a quintessential British quirk.

“From another state? That’s a joke, right?”
There was some ‘gossip’ during those mid nineties that managers aka coaches would be recruited from outside the state very soon. “How is that possible,” people used to ask. It seemed inappropriate that a coach would coach a side whose culture he didn’t share. After all domestic cricket represented ethnicity Vs ethnicity. But that omen was true and is visible today.

How times have changed. For the better or course. Sanath now goes on to coach a side that beat his native Karnataka in the last Ranji Trophy championship, but of course, it was a pitch that was highly unstable and if anybody, offered a chance for the lesser side, Baroda.

Early planning
Of note is that the appointment of Sanath to Baroda has come a good four months before the Ranji Trophy starts. Again a good change and showing how professional we’ve become in India. This gives the coach time to plan, understand the boys in his new team, talk to the concerned cricket Association about their aspirations and give it their best combined effort.

Sanath’s home side
In the year gone by, some journalists had slammed the Karnataka State Cricket Association for not appointing a captain well in advance, rather only about 15 days before the tournament. “Time is needed even for the captain to build himself into his role, even if he be a veteran” was the refrain. Of course, default captain Rahul Dravid would not be playing in all matches of the domestic championship because of international cricket commitments. Whether or not this had a bad effect, the Karnataka side was stopped in the semi finals.

Is Baroda’s advance planning a cue then that everbody’s getting professional and want “a plan” and that too well in advance? Good direction there.

Love of the game
Sanath is not just another busybody in coaching. The ex Karnataka Ranji Trophy fast bowler has been involved with coaching programs even in the early ‘90s when “none existed,” not monetarily at least. Anyway, steering away from metaphors, it’s noteworthy that Sanath coached when he had nothing to gain. A true blue cricket devotee and a fine coach today.

Early Domestic Migrants
Coaches emigrating for a season to another state is not a new event. Paras Mhambrey after coaching his native Mumbai was hired by Maharashtra in the early 2000 decade. Karnataka stumper Sadanand Vishwanath although an umpire at the domestic level was always an “early bird.” He ensured he coached for Vidarbha in the early 2000 decade but of course was content umpiring in his state of Karnataka.

Here comes the era of advance planning. The good part is, it involves India’s domestic cricket.

Succession Planning

By Vikram Afzulpurkar

Should MS Dhoni be cloned? Not in a science lab but by the BCCI. The star captain has done more to transform Indian cricket than arguably any player in its history. Do we simply wait for the future (and captains) to unfold? Is there anything to be passed on from Dhoni?


Best Captain Ever

MS Dhoni has been referred to as Captain Cool, Captain Fantastic and also acknowledged by former Test cricketers as the best Indian captain ever.

In the same era, India has developed another facet, of bench strength, that is, having a larger pool of active players. Of course, part of that has been because the Indian team plays more cricket than any other country.

Successful Succession Planning
Finally, looking back from the early part of the 2000 decade, India seems to have done succession planning. It continued blooding young players and re-trying discarded wonder boys instead of resting on the established one. But few can doubt down that beneath these systematic approaches, golden touch captain MS Dhoni has been responsible for India’s two major successes during his barely four-year term – the T20 World Cup 2007 and the World Cup 2011. Of course, India became a powerhouse in all formats of the game, leave these more coveted trophies.

As an Individual MS Dhoni’s captaincy record stretches to winning two IPL trophies and one Champions League T20 trophy , besides of course his team Chennai Super Kings figuring in the semi finals of all four editions of the former.

Future-captain camp
Is it a good time to table a meeting with Dhoni and ask him to train our ‘future captain?’ Be in Suresh Raina or Virat Kohli or anyone else. It’s a camp only metaphorically, because the effort would be to make the incumbent to observe the skipper’s style, changes and communication methods. For that matter, it’s even worth asking MS who he forsees as his kind of a captain.

Grey haired Dhoni captains on..
It’s easily possible that Dhoni will captain India at least until the next World Cup in 2015. Why, even if age catches up with him, the selectors may play him into relative ‘old age’ just like England did Mike Brearley in the early ‘80s. Brearley did not command his place in the side on his playing abilities but was a psychologist cricketer whose side subsequently beat the ‘old enemy’ Australia in the series titled ‘Botham’s Ashes.’

The Probables
There’s no doubt that Virat Kohli is a player and captain of good ability. Although everyone has their style, should not the BCCI ‘migrate’ the captaincy style of Jharkhand’s Dhoni to the Captain Elect of India.

Shelf Life
Well, it may be too early to take this approach if the selectors persist with Dhoni purely on captaincy abilities until the 2019 World Cup. But one never knows what developments sprout. Dhoni himself has said that he will play until he enjoys the game and has even jokingly rebutted questions of supposed retirement plans. Perhaps more as a testimony to Tendulkar’s undying passion for the game, he predicts that his retirement will probably come before the past master’s.