The former wicket-keeper and opening batter of India, Robin Uthappa, has looked back to one of the hard times of Indian cricket during the 2007 ODI World Cup when they failed to qualify from the group stage of the event in the West Indies. The Rahul Dravid-led side lost both their crucial games against Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, as one of the dark chapters under the coaching of Greg Chappell kept no end to controversies.
Robin Uthappa was part of India’s top order in the tournament. In their opening games against the Tigers at the Queen’s Park Oval in Trinidad, he could manage only nine runs as they were bundled out for 191, a score that was chased down with five wickets in hand by Bangladesh. After a heavy win over Bermuda, they lost their third encounter against Sri Lanka by 69 runs.
The Karnataka-born has spilled the beans on what went wrong in that campaign as he accused their coach of running agendas and alleged that the former Australian batter used to leak the close information of the dressing room.
Robin Uthappa reveals senior batter’s disagreement on Greg Chappell’s strength training
Chappell has been no surprise regarding controversies in Indian cricket, as the rift between him and the captain, Sourav Ganguly, went public, and the former was never able to win the trust of the cricketing public in India. The group stage exit for the blue brigade was the final nail in the coffin as he resigned from the position.
“The environment of that team was very bad). Greg Chappell was running an agenda. He was coaching with an Aussie mindset, saying, ‘This is how we do things in Australia. ‘ I don’t think he ever respected Indian culture. He came in and tried to bring the Australian culture. The environment of that team was very bad.” Robin Uthappa expressed this during a recent interview with Lallantop.
“He also had a bad habit of leaking information when things didn’t go according to his plans. That didn’t run well with the players. He leaked dressing room information.” The 39-year-old addressed.
However, Robin Uthappa had a good relationship with Chappell but reckoned that the seniors on the side used to disagree with the veteran because of him introducing the concept of strength training, something that was new in that era.
“As a youngster, Greg Chappell was very good to me. I just entered the team. I was young, and he used to back youngsters. As a 20-year-old, my dream was to play for India, win for India hopefully, one World Cup I will win for India.” The former right-handed batter for the Blue Brigade explained.
The former batter of the Chennai Super Kings, who has smashed 1183 runs in 54 innings of the white ball at an average of around 25 and a strike rate of more than 100 with the help of seven half-centuries, felt that while playing for the country, one always wants to dominate and doesn’t care for anything else.
Robin Uthappa also believed that the South Australian top-order batter didn’t get the support and respect from the seniors, which was also going to bring the curtains down in his career.
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“It was during the Greg Chappell era when strength training was introduced. In Australia, it already existed. Greg Chappell saw that missing in India. Fitness was not the way of life. He was trying to bring in change.” The former batter elaborated.
“At that point, he found resistance from the seniors. They were not used to the fact that a guy was coming and imposing things on us without showing us the basic respect that is shown.” Robin Uthappa concluded.