After the T20 World Cup failure, India sacked Ravi Shastri from their head coach position. Rahul Dravid was hired in place of him. His era as a coach of the Indian national team started with the home series against New Zealand.
His team did well there winning both the T20 and test series. A series win against the current World T20 runner-up and the current world test champions was the best start Rahul Dravid could ask to begin his reign.
His next project is the ongoing tour to South Africa. And India have already won the first test by 113 runs.
Here we won’t talk about Rahul Dravid’s present. We will take a look into the legend’s past, how he planned his way to the India national cricket team–a plan which looks so simple yet so elegant–for which he deserves nothing but praise.
To understand this, let’s put some context. Let’s look at Rahul Dravid’s coaching record for Indian cricket.
He was appointed in 2016 by BCCI as the head coach of both the India-U19 and India-A teams. The reason was simple - to build young cricketers under the supervision of one of the most technically solid batters ever. Rahul had tremendous success with them.
In 2016, he did brilliant with the India-U19 team at the U19 World Cup, took them to the finals but couldn’t get past a talented Windies side.
In 2017, India parted ways with Anil Kumble as head coach after his reported mismatch with Virat Kohli. Rahul Dravid was offered the job but he refused. It was a well-circulated rumour back then. Later, it was confirmed by former BCCI CoA Vinod Rai in an interview in 2020.
This is where the genius works. As per Vindo Rai, Rahul Dravid showed two reasons. One was professional and one was personal.
The personal reason was that he had to give some time to his family. That, however, cannot be the main reason. Because he was coaching two teams then, maintaining his time properly for profession and family.
So, the prime reason was the professional one. He felt that his work with the U19 and the ‘A’ team was incomplete. He felt that he needed to groom the players more. As a result, he refused the job.
In 2018, he crossed the final hurdle in another U19 World Cup. His team beat Australia in the finals and took the trophy home.
In July of 2019, he parted ways with them and was appointed to work with NCA as the Director of Cricket Operations in Bangalore. His work was highly praised there as many talented cricketers were discovered in his era from Bangalore.
Being the coach of the A team, Rahul Dravid contributed a lot to the India national team. Some of the regular faces of the team over the last 5 years were directly guided by him.
Yuzvendra Chahal, Hardik Pandya, Shardul Thakur, Deepak Chahar, Rishabh Pant, Shreyash Iyer, Mohammad Siraj, Mayank Agarwal, Hanuma Vihari Washington Sundar, Axar Patel were all part of his ‘India Blues team,’ giving their career a new lifeline.
Dravid’s work was not supposed to stop there and it didn’t. He is now the head coach of the national team until the 2023 World Cup.
Now, let’s look at the India test squad for the ongoing South Africa tour. 8 players of that squad are over the age of 33. Another four are over 30. A crop of core players is nearing the end of their careers.
It is obvious that Rahul Dravid’s main job would be to build the next-gen core of India National Cricket, saving them from the suffering of an imminent transition phase.
Now, if you look at the Indian side, who do you think would be in that next-gen team?
The likes of Hardik Pandya, Shreyash Iyer, Mohammad Siraj, Deepak Chahar, Rishabh Pant, should be the leaders.
Prithvi Shaw, Shubhman Gill, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ishan Kishan, Shivam Mavi, Washington Sundar, Rahul Chahar, Avesh Khan, Prasidh Krishna - all are at the peak of their careers as well.
Guess the link among the aforementioned set of players. They were all coached or prepared by Rahul Dravid himself.
Some in the U19, some in the A team and some in both. Basically, Dravid is supposed to guide a set of players whom he already built from scratch. Refusing the job in 2017 makes sense now, right?
It is a brilliant journey, maybe a well-planned journey to glory; so simple yet so elegant. We can only assume that he did everything with a purpose. Even if he didn’t, that doesn’t take anything away from the great man.
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