The mindsweeper from Mumbai

Chulani’s in regular touch with a host of South Africans and Aussies as well as Indian cricketers who seek him out for troubles as varied as ‘How do I stop thoughts from meddling with the mind?’ to ‘How do I deal with criticism that I’ve lost confidence?’ Inconsistency issues torment most cricketers too,though the most ambitious anyone’s ever gotten in confessing their goals has been a certain cricketer who said that he wanted to leave a legacy of being India’s hardest working cricketer like a Rahul Dravid. “Some of them come and tell me they don’t want to be IPL greats,but India greats.”

Perhaps the more fascinating part of the job has been the ease with which he’s dealt with cricketers from different cultures. His degree from Georgetown University has given him a world-rounded view as well as the felicity to understand different mindsets. His vaguely western twang doesn’t hurt. “For example,Aussies have a different way of interacting,and I can also understand how misinterpretations happen!” he says. “But in mixed teams like in IPL,I look for commonalities and help forge a united unique identity,” he says. For starters,he refuses to acknowledge domestic and international players as that,and make those distinctions and is acutely aware of the different pressures at work.

“While Indians may be driven by the whole IPL to international stage leaps,an Australian suffers intense pressure from their media and also typically carries a huge weight of the club paying them so much and hence the pressure to perform.”

What Chulani insists has helped him is the fact that he doesn’t play the old,wise headmaster to them but remains the yuppie,buddy they call AC or Anandbhai. Then there’s those like Russel Mark who are legends with set systems,from whom Chulani learns plenty.

His thoughts on the recent upheaval in Australian cricket stay true to his fraternity – of the coaching staff and leadership. “If your team’s lost two matches and the coach throws down a challenge and asks Who will stand up and be counted? – you are expected to take responsibility. These guys failed to do it. However,being kicked out of a Test might seem too stringent,but punishment depends on whether it’s a one-time offence. In some cases it might galvanise an individual,at others harm him. But the situation certainly demanded that the players ger a rap on the knuckles.” His dream assignment though would be to work with someone like Virender Sehwag or Gautam Gambhir. “They’ve been proven match-winners,who are now grappling with comebacks. Maybe they need just that nudge to take that final step to greatness.”

Chulani’s methods aren’t too complex though and he doesn’t exactly look up Freudian theories in dusty libraries to figure out cricketers. “I don’t believe in that dark,’ tell me about your childhood’ stuff. I speak their tongue,use colourful language and there’s no mumbo jumbo.” Any notions he had about transposing some of the textbook mind training bookish techniques into the real world came to a nought with one incident at Kings XI Punjab,and he’s learnt to tweak,tinker and improvise ever since. “I’d suggested players do a reverrse countdown from 10 to 0 as a focus technique. One of the local players either didn’t understand or thought it too cumbersome,and just broke into an impromptu bhangra. The foreigners joined in,and the pressure was relieved,” he remembers.