A West side story

This is the same team against whom opponents would fancy accumulating maximum points till not so long ago. Delhi might not have given them much importance in the season opener but were in for a surprise when they decided to go for an outright win chasing 157 runs in 30 overs. When the last mandatory over was being bowled it was Delhi8217;s last pair of Rahul Sanghvi and Amit Bhandari battling to avoid a humiliating defeat.

Bengal skipper Rohan Gavaskar made the same mistake, deciding to set Gujarat a victory target of 217 in 42 overs on a last day pitch. His sporting declaration backfired, resulting in Bengal going down by two wickets.

Gaekwad, who was appointed consultant coach of the Gujarat team last year, said his main contribution was in making the players believe in themselves and in their ability to score over their opponents. 8216;8216;I was never in doubt that these boys were talented. I just tried to bring in some discipline and change their approach to the game. I wanted to make them realise that they too can go for outright wins. All they needed was to believe within that they can do it,8217;8217; said Gaekwad.

Elaborating, Gaekwad said, 8216;8216;Batsmen now are trying to play long innings and bowlers are bending their backs more to extract life from the wickets. That8217;s the reason our seamers have been more successful so far. Importance have also been given to the fitness programmes and that has shown.8217;8217;

Benefitting from the new, improved set-up are players like Sidharth Trivedi, Aakash Cristian and Neeraj Patel 8212; brilliant at the junior level, but pedestrian since 8212; who have made a strong comeback.

Gujarat play Railways next at the Motera from December 4 and if we believe Gaekwad when he says, 8216;8216;This is just 50 per cent of what they can do8217;8217;, Railways should also prepare hard. Else, they might suffer the Bengal fate.