India made their way to the Sinhalese Sports Club early on Tuesday to begin preparations for the 2nd Test against Sri Lanka in Colombo. With a confidence boosting win in the 1st Test at Galle, India looked positive in the nets with batsmen batting in pairs and bowlers taking their turns to get into a good rhythm. Keeping a close watch on the proceedings was Head Coach Ravi Shastri who was often seen telling a thing or two to his boys during the session.
The team has looked at ease and relaxed with a lot of positivity oozing in the side. The players and support staff are aware of their respective goals and everyone seems to be enjoying their time with the team. For Shastri, who has been a manager and team director in the past, it was a case of just walking into the setup and pushing the play button. As simple as that.
“I don’t carry any baggage. For me, it was like walking into the dressing room as I had left it. Nothing had changed and no special buttons I had to be pressed. It was just that one play button and off you went,” he said. “I have been a manager, director, now I am head coach and it’s absolutely the same role. There is nothing that I have to change. The fact that you played the game and watched the game for long periods of time without a break does help. So, you know what’s contemporary and what’s happening at the moment and you relate with people in that fashion. I don’t think at this level coaching is needed.
“At this level, it is all about fine tuning and getting the blokes in good mental space to go out and play the game. At times, you might need to just fine tune them a bit because the amount of cricket that’s being played you might just get into the odd bad habit without you realizing it. That’s where the experience of having played, probably having watched you can pick it up and pass the message.”
Elaborating further about his role, he said, “My role is to be in charge of the entire support staff and to make sure that we get the boys in some great mental space to go out and express themselves with nothing else on their minds but to go out and play a brand of cricket which you have seen India play over the last three years; that is positive and fearless.”
That the team was in the first Test at Galle where India won the game in just four days and a mammoth margin of 304 runs. For Shastri and co. though, there was no room for complacency. “The boys were fantastic in the last Test match but what we are striving for is improvement. There are still areas to improve from the last game and we have discussed that. What we want from this team as a unit collectively is consistency. Not just where you are good in one game and totally the opposite in the other. Your levels of consistency have to be high.”
