Filling in the blank

From a stale team in 2000 under the cloud of match-fixing allegations, Wright helped transform it to a unit world teams feared; captains thought twice before setting targets. There were problems amid the success but it was clear the team was slowly working its way towards being among the best.

That it didn’t reach there — especially in the one-day arena — was down to one factor: Control, or lack of it. Almost throughout his tenure, Wright was denied the reins. He didn’t have a say in selection, his authority was challenged, and the renewal of his contract each season was a struggle.

All this showed up in the last few months, probably the worst of Wright’s stint, when India only managed to win one series against Bangladesh and a home series against South Africa.

The message was clear. When the BCCI sign on a new coach, they need to give him a weightier profile. For inspiration, they could look no farther than Pakistan, where Bob Woolmer picks the team he wants. Indeed, Woolmer is probably the single most important cricketing person in Pakistan since Imran Khan.

Further afield, New Zealand’s John Bracewell is also the convener of selectors and in England Duncan Fletcher has a vote in selection. In fact England will now have an extended squad to give Fletcher greater control over all the leading English cricketers. Similar schemes are in effect in South Africa and Australia, where the coach has the right to pull someone out of a game if need be or call them for special coaching sessions.

India needs to follow suit. The coach needs to have more powers over the players, over their commitments that might collide with the team interest, a vote in selection and above all the power to bench a player — irrespective of his reputation, his commercial interests. Just like in international soccer.

Wright’s statement that asked for selectors to be paid professionals, accountable for their jobs would also be a step in the right direction.

It would also be a good idea for the BCCI to ensure that the coach spends time with domestic coaches, so that the ideas flowing to the national team can percolate down the system. Wright spent a good amount of his time in India but had no control over the other coaches nor was he ever invited to hold a coaches camp during the off-season.

Result: there is not a single Indian coach among the favourites to take over from him. And that is the biggest indictment of the system.

THE CONTENDERS
In their own words

DAV WHATMORE: One of the major advantages that Dav Whatmore has over Tom Moody and Greg Chappell is that he has worked with sub-continental teams (Sri Lanka and Bangladesh).

But Whatmore believes that the one major difference he found from his time as the Lancashire county side and the Asian sides was the sub-continental culture. ‘‘For some it may take time to settle down, others imbibe it faster. That apart, everything else remains the same. Technical aspects of the game, managing the players does not vary much, because they are uniform in every part of the world. The better part of this job is the talent they have, especially in the batting, and how everything comes naturally to the guys here.’’

TOM MOODY: ‘‘You have to balance attitude with talent and culture’’, Moody says. ‘‘Combining these qualities in the right measure gives you the desired result.’’

‘‘The main job you do as coach is channelize the talent available in the same direction. The other main thing is to get them to do that consistently.

Former Australian all-rounder Shane Lee believes that Moody — his captain at Western Australia — would excel as India coach because of his ability to understand players. ‘‘India is a country of various types of people. Tom would thrive because he has worked very well in the county set-up, where players are from all over the world. He has a great ability to work with the players, because he knows what makes each one tick.’’

GREG CHAPPELL: He has the backing of Sourav Ganguly and the best credentials to sort out India’s batting woes.

On his website, Greg lists the credentials for a coach.

‘‘He should be a man manager who can help the player tackle technical, mental and personal problems. He should be someone who organises the team preparation and who can work with the captain on planning and tactical issues. A coach should be able to help the individuals to grow as people as well as develop as cricketers. The coaching model that is being used by most countries is outmoded. The Australian model of a manager who manages the coaching process is the closest to being the right model’’, he says.

‘Coach, captain should share a vision’
BOB WOOLMER on what any prospective India coach should be

At the international level a coach needs to be a facilitator to the needs of the team and captain at the time. I suspect that India should prefer someone with international experience and au fait with technology and the modern requirements of the game.

The coach and captain should share a vision with those in Indian cricket who set the itineraries and financial needs. The salary structure of contracted players will mean that they have to play a certain number of international Tests and ODIs to offset through television and sponsorships.

Most major organisations will have planning meetings and regular updates on their position now and where they would like to be in the short, medium and long term. Goal-setting never did anyone any harm.

The one name I’m hearing in this connection is that of Greg Chappell. He’s an extremely knowledgeable coach but would be dealing at the international level for the first time. Greg was an excellent captain and I am sure would have a vision as to where he would like to take the Indian team.

The key for him, or any coach, is getting the players (a) to buy into that vision and (b) getting the players to buy into the process needed to attain that vision. It’s not necessary, of course, that the coach is a foreigner; if there were a coach from the sub-continent that fits into the captain’s vision then he would be able to do a good job. The key again is the relationship between captain and coach.

India could also experiment with having a bowling coach. That would, however, depend on the new coach, the necessary funding for that position and who the individual is. If the players feel the need for that sort of involvement and the funding is available then there is nothing wrong with the idea. It works in American baseball, it could well work in India.

Going by the buch
JOHN BUCHANAN, the cerebral coach, lays down the principles that he follows

EVERY coach is different in style, philosophy and therefore approach. My approach to coaching is based on a set of principles that in essence form my personal philosophy.

VISION: The coach needs to have a clear vision of what he wants to achieve. That vision will need constant revisiting as the team evolves. While the basic tenet of the vision should not change (which assumes the coach ‘sees’ correctly in the first place), the vision will be reworked for various teams, events and where the team ‘is’ at a stage of their development. The vision will also be accommodated for the individuals within and around the team

WHOLE PERSON: The coach must clearly understand he is dealing with people first, cricketers second. While each individual is currently devoting themselves to cricket, the individual needs to develop a range of other skills to deal with life and everything else that is involved with cricket apart from the playing

LEARNING ENVIRONMENT: The coach needs to be able to create an environment that allows all players, support staff, team to grow. It is an environment of challenge, but non-threatening. Every process, system within this environment is open to question with a view to improving it to ‘best practice’.

COACH TO BE REDUNDANT: A critical part of the coach’s vision must be to ensure that players are their own best coach; i.e. they know how to prepare themselves to give themselves the best chance of performing

PLANNING: The coach must be very well planned for each meeting, each training session, for each match, for each series, for each year, and for years into the future. The coach is instrumental in constructing the plan within which there is freedom to play

CULTURE: While each of the principles above in themselves develop a team culture, none in isolation will. The coach needs to be very vigilant on all tangible and intangible elements which occur every moment of every day to ensure the values that are espoused are not just words but actions.