Indian Cricketers Fortunate To Have Anil Kumble As Head Coach: John Wright
Jan 9, 2019 at 4:09 PM
John Wright, the former coach of Indian cricket team has said that the current Indian cricketers are fortunate to have Anil Kumble as the Head Coach of the side,
“The current group of India players are so fortunate to have Kumble as their coach. He’s an outstanding man of great integrity and great intelligence,” Wright told TOI.
Wright, who coached the Indian team from the year 2000 to 2005 has earlier worked with Kumble in the Mumbai Indians camp when he was the Head Coach of the side and Kumble was the chief mentor. The same year, the Mumbai-based franchise went on to win their maiden title in the sixth attempt.
However, in November 2015, after spending three years with the side, Kumble stepped down from the post due to conflict of interest issues. In 2015 as well Mumbai Indians won the IPL cup.
Wright further had a piece of advice for Indian team as he said that the batsmen have to adapt to conditions in England soon so as find success,
“India’s got a good team. Your pace attack is perhaps the most potent it’s ever been. The Indian seamers were very good in India earlier, and if Anil Kumble (the current India coach) can ensure that they stay disciplined (in terms of line and length) in England, it would be tough to beat India. However, your batsmen need to adapt quickly to the conditions, because it’ll be early summer in England, and the ball will seam around. In fact, the team which the quickest in adapting to the English conditions will win the tournament,” he added.
Surely, Wright’s word carries a lot of importance as Indian batsmen have to adapt to the conditions well and soon as there the conditions are very much different from India. Along with that, India hasn’t played any form of ODI cricket from past four months and have been on T20 mode from past two months, so the first challenge for them will be to switch off the T20 mode and get ready for the 50 over challenge.
Indian team is going into the tournament as defending champions, which adds pressure on them and also this time the squad have got a new captain in form of Virat Kohli, who will be leading the side in an ICC tournament for the first time.
There are multiple challenges that await India which they have to circumvent in order to retain the cup.