IPL captains and coaches: Changing preferences

Why have Indian Premier League teams gravitated towards Indian captains and steered clear (almost) of Indian coaches?

Everything seems a little less important and a little more redundant in the wake of a death in the cricketing family.

Just as the idea to assess why Indian Premier League teams have gravitated towards Indian captains and steered clear (almost) of Indian coaches seems futile in the wake of Shane Warne’s passing. But even as that wrenching feeling remains suspended between reality and disbelief for a fraternity in mourning, the answer to the posed question arrives through a deafening silence.

Rajasthan Royals’ greatest moment to date came in the inaugural season of the IPL. They won their first and last title in 2008. Warne was the orchestrator of this great heist.

Read | When Shane Warne sparked a 'beer controversy' during his IPL days

The greatest captain Australia never had was the greatest captain Rajasthan have ever had, and he also happened to be the coach. Even if the genius of his craft was physically on the wane at 37, cricket’s enfant terrible had experienced enough in a life so vibrant that the younger lot in Rajasthan were shown the blueprint to greatness.

Communication, even Warne admitted then, was a concern early on as many in the team were not exposed to English, having barely gone to school in rural India. He figured it out: he spoke little and showed more. In this, a family was born, and then came the crown. Warne was king.

That same year, three Indians were given head-coach responsibilities: Lalchand Rajput’s Mumbai Indians finished fifth. Venkatesh Prasad’s Royal Challengers Bangalore ended seventh. Robin Singh’s Deccan Chargers finish at the bottom of the eight-team tournament.

These three very-qualified coaches had played a role in India winning the 2007 T20 World Cup so franchisees assumed it best, but that assumption backfired, and how.

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Prasad recalled: “When I came into the RCB, there was too much pressure. They wanted to run the team like a corporation. They were not ready to listen or accept the psychology of the cricketers. You cannot just go back to the board and draw all these things. It doesn’t work like that. The franchises I worked for were expecting a mountain.”

And so began the trend to hire foreign coaches. In fact, last year, Punjab Kings’ Anil Kumble was the only Indian coach on the roster. The former Indian skipper wasn’t too happy about it either.

“When an Indian coach says something to an Indian player, is the impact the same when it comes to an overseas coach? No, I don’t think so,” Ray Jennings, the former RCB coach, had noted earlier. “What I mean to say is that the players see Kumble every day but not (Ricky) Ponting. They are in awe of Ponting.

“However, my experience with some of the Indian coaches like Venkatesh Prasad was superb because he was a tremendous help for me. He used to communicate with Indian players far more effectively than me and it made my task easier,” he added.

That goes some way in explaining why so many Indians are employed as support staff. While well-travelled and oh-so-experienced foreign coaches are well-versed at their craft, they need local help to put their ideas across. Communication is still key. “There’s a massive ego thing too,” said a former coach on condition of anonymity. “Indian players, especially the icons, can be very difficult to handle for an Indian coach. They have often said things like ‘what do you know? or you haven’t played enough so don’t tell me what to do.’ That’s why when players like Kumble or (Rahul) Dravid take over, many of them, even the current stars, don’t say anything because those guys have done it all. You better not question them.

“And with foreign coaches, there is that tendency to listen because the illusion is that they know more and have seen more. I don’t think that’s true, but owners don’t want to take that chance, especially given that the track record for Indian coaches in the IPL hasn’t been good,” he added.

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The upcoming season will see three Indian coaches across ten teams with Kumble still in charge of Punjab, Sanjay Bangar at helm in RCB and Ashish Nehra cast for the role in Gujarat Titans.

At the other end of the spectrum, eight teams (possibly nine if RCB pick an Indian for the role) have named domestic captains. Kane Williamson is the exception to the ‘rule’ for Sunrisers Hyderabad.

Oddly enough, that was the case in the inaugural season too with Warne being the exception to the rule of Indian stalwarts assuming marshalling duties. Over the years, the likes of Adam Gilchrist, David Warner, Kumar Sangakkara, Ricky Ponting, Steven Smith and Eoin Morgan have donned the role, but only three titles were won with foreign skippers.

“Indian captains are definitely more beneficial in their understanding of the Indian on-field culture,” explains an IPL scout. “They are more intuitive in these conditions, which is expected. Very few foreign players have the expertise for dynamic decisions during games. Coaches aren’t expected to do that. They are mostly there to keep egos in check and offer insight.

“It will begin to change as more and more Indian legends from the 90s and 2000s are taking up coaching duties. Once that happens, the number of foreign coaches will reduce,” he adds.

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A member of the support staff for a franchise noted that stature plays a massive role, especially at the level of coaching because teams are, conventionally, built around the strength of their foreign talent. He noticed that team owners looked to appease travelling cricketers and their needs through foreign coaches and gave full autonomy to local support staff to take care of the domestic players, especially those who were young and looking for direction.

“…that has changed a bit since a lot of these young players are already good with their English, thanks to social media, but having someone speak a local language makes life so much easier. It’s comforting,” he observed.

Here are some uncomfortable facts: since the inception of the IPL, six Indian coaches have been given charge, including the two new names from the upcoming season. In that duration, twenty-seven foreign players were experimented with as captains.

That level of disparity is hard to look past. And as Dilip Vengsarkar once noted: “How many Indian coaches are coaching teams in other countries, leagues like Australia’s Big Bash etc? We find none. So why should we hire foreign coaches? I feel our coaches are equally good and some of them are even better.”

Perhaps not better than Warne, or other foreigners who have succeeded in his wake, but the trend doesn’t look good on Aatmanirbhar Bharat.

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