Rain might have delayed Rahul Dravid’s start of journey as the permanent Test captain, but despite the third day washout he seemed at peace. Ask him about the recent turnaround of the Indian team since he took over and Rahul Dravid’s state of mind comes through: ‘‘At times there are no destinations, it is the journey that one should enjoy.’’ On a cloudy Chennai evening, hearing Dravid seems like reading Rudyard Kipling’s lines: ‘‘If you can meet with triumph and disaster, treat those two impostors just the same.’’ Push him more about his team turning the corner, it is real tough going past Dravid’s solid defence. ‘‘Honestly, it’s all too early. I don’t want to look at the results in terms of turnaround. There are no corners to turn, the main aim for me as captain is to keep improving with every game,’’ he says, demystifying the whole euphoria about India’s 6-1 win over Sri Lanka and the very creditable 2-2 result against South Africa. And this same attitude — of not losing prospective over scorelines — is seen when one questions the Indian captain about Pakistan’s 2-0 Test series win over England, the two teams that India will be facing in the coming months. ‘‘I, of course, have seen the action on television and so have the boys. As they will be our opponents and so we look at the way they bat and bowl but one must not read too much into the results. Every Test is a different challenge. The conditions are different and so are the situations,’’ he says. He, however, does agree that the Pakistani team is very different from the one that India encountered in the last away series. ‘‘When they toured India, they were improving and against England they have raised the bar,’’ he adds. But the Indian captain is in no mood to give their opponents an edge before the series and compliments coach Greg Chappell’s comments about taking it as a challenge and not travelling to Pakistan ‘‘with the fear of failure’’. Dravid says: ‘‘As we have seen them win, they too have an idea about how we are playing. Our team, too, has had some great results recently.’’ With the India ODI team always talked about in terms of their long-term goal of the World Cup in 2007 what about the Test vision of the team? Dravid prefers a focused approach for the five-day game. ‘‘It is all about winning the game and taking it Test-by-Test,’’ he says. Still, can the Indian bowlers, who after getting used to the slow and low pitches at home, adjust to the fast and faster tracks in Pakistan and in the West Indies later? Dravid sticks to his stance as he says, ‘‘Right now the team is concentrating on playing the Test series against Sri Lanka.’’ Planning and strategising for the away tours will be worked out at the camps before leaving for Pakistan and the West Indies. He is aware of the importance of pacers on away tours and talks about the experience in the pace pool and the recent additions that one saw in the one-dayers. He also talks about the seniors in the side, the vital inputs they bring along, the departmentalising of responsibility and also his right as the captain to scrutinise all suggestions he receives. The organised approach that has been the trademark of his batting is very much evident in his style of captaincy. But doesn’t the meticulous planning to his batting get affected by the recent responsibilities of deciding the right line-up, keeping a tab of the opposition gameplan and taking a stock of the conditions? Dravid is very clear that there are no compromises. ‘‘I have a set routine while preparing as a batsman. I consider the opposition bowlers, the areas of scoring opportunities and method in which I need to bat keeping in mind the pitch. I go through this routine all the time despite the responsibilities as a captain. There are also suggestions from the coach and Ian Frazer and they also help me deal with all this,’’ he says. As one talks with Dravid in the hotel lobby, one sees a stream of Sri Lankan players walking in with their families with heavy polythene shopping bags in tow. There are no Indians in sight and one wonders where they are. Soon the autograph hunters move towards the basement gym. It’s time for the organised Indian team with the captain leading by example to pump the iron.
