Sourav Ganguly says India are looking for a coach who can win matches

What’s the story?

Former Indian captain and a member of the Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC), Sourav Ganguly said that finding a coach who will win India games is the top priority. Following Anil Kumble’s resignation, India’s CAC has opened up to more applicants. This indicates that there will be a focus on coaches who propagate a winning mentality.

Ganguly, when asked about what type of coach the CAC were looking for, simply said, “One who can win games”.

In case you didn’t know…

Anil Kumble’s resignation sent shockwaves through Indian cricket as it came with a dressing down of the team from Kumble and the rift between Kohli and the former coach. The CAC received six applications, one of which was Kumble himself. Richard Pybus, Tom Moody, Lalchand Rajput, Virender Sehwag and Dodda Ganesh were the other candidates. The CAC has since asked for more applicants to step up.

The details

The winning approach India has cultivated in recent times, holding the respective trophies against all eight other Test nations (Ireland and Afghanistan excluded, for obvious reasons). The BCCI want to continue this in their next coach as well.

This may not be the most prudent of approaches, considering that India’s stars are ageing and developing new talent should be top of the agenda ahead of the 2019 World Cup and the start of the Test league.

What’s next?

The coaching role must be decided ahead of India’s tour of Sri Lanka, allowing them less than a month to go through all the new applications, interview the candidates and decide on a coach. They will have to find a candidate who gels well with the captain as well as understands the BCCI’s aim for cricket in the next few years. The coach the BCCI is looking for will probably be more experienced than Kumble or Shastri in an effort to rectify the mistakes of the past.

Author’s take

The coaching fiasco has gone on for far too long already. The CAC needs to transparently decide what they are looking for and how far the captain’s personality affects their decision. Furthermore, they also need to focus on building a team for the future, now that India’s stars are mostly over 30 years old.

The development of young talent like Rishabh Pant, Shreyas Iyer and Kuldeep Yadav must happen now so that they get proper international experience prior to the World Cup in 2019 unless of course, they want to pull a Pakistan, field three debutants and an 18-year-old, and win the whole tournament.