With Border-Gavaskar Trophy done, India eye World Test Championship

Sending Duke balls to bowlers, flying players to London early to acclimatise to the conditions and monitoring the potential World Test Championship final candidates during the Indian Premier League are some of the proposals that the Indian think-tank intends to implement as the Rohit Sharma-led team prepares for the ICC's red-ball global championship.

Having wrapped up the Border-Gavaskar Trophy series 2-1 following a draw with Australia in the fourth and final Test here at the Narendra Modi Cricket Stadium on Monday, Rahul Dravid-Rohit combo's next big assignment will be the WTC final at the Oval from June 7-11, and the duo has already drawn a plan to prepare for the summit clash for which they qualified on Monday following New Zealand's thrilling two-wicket win over Sri Lanka in Christchurch.

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Come to think of it, the head coach-captain alliance of the Indian cricket team has been on the same page on several critical matters - be it giving a player an extended run, having clarity on which player to play between two performing players (for example, Shubman Gill over Ishan Kishan) or the nature of the pitches they want to play on among others.

Given the tight schedule in the run-up to the prestigious final, the team management has a difficult job of maintaining players' workload and making most of the short preparatory time between IPL and WTC final.

To begin with, India will be engaged in a three-match ODI series against Australia from March 17-22. Five days after the last ODI, the 16th edition of the Indian Premier League will kick off. The 10-team tournament will end on May 28, leaving just seven days' gap before the final starts.

Barring Cheteshwar Pujara, all the players that can potentially be picked for the final (subject to fitness) will be part of the IPL and managing their workload during the hectic tournament and getting them ready for red-ball cricket in completely different conditions are going to be as crucial as challenging.

"We just qualified at lunchtime today. I wasn't counting my chickens before they hatched. We'll celebrate this for starters," Dravid said while talking about the WTC final. "It is going to be a challenge. There's going to be a lot of logistics involved given the IPL final is only a week before the WTC final. We'll think about it."

A few minutes later skipper Rohit gave a peak into the plans they earnestly hope to implement phase by phase in the build up to the final.

"Look, I think it's quite critical for us, we are going to keep in constant touch with all the players who are going to play that (WTC) final and monitor their workload and see what is happening with them," noted Rohit when asked about the importance of monitoring players.

"In fact, we are sending some Duke balls to all fast bowlers and if they get some time to bowl with that... but again it all depends on individuals, guys who will be part of final are not the guys who have not played in the UK and may be one or two guys here and there and rest all of us have played in that part of the world. I don't think it will be a huge problem...

"Look, I believe in preparation and preparations will be key for us come the final. Around 21st May (the last league match), there will be six teams which will possibly be out of IPL play-off contention and so whichever players are available, we will try and find time to get them to the UK as early as possible and get some time and we will monitor as much as possible," he offered.

Indian teams, time to time, have had preparation camps ahead of a big series or a tournament. In fact, they stayed back in England for a bilateral five-Test series for close to a month after the inaugural WTC final against New Zealand in Southampton in 2021. But the current team management's attention to detail is not just impressive but novel to Indian cricket also.