India A is More About Developing as a Player, Says Rahul Dravid

Former Team India legendary batsman Rahul Dravid is having a busy time in the contemporary cricket. He is the head coach of the India A junior teams. It was he who decided to coach the junior and the budding cricketers as he felt the international level cricketers are already finished products.

Dravid felt that more of proper coaching is required at the junior level. After the ongoing quadrangular series, India A will now play a four-day game in September.

Dravid was grateful to Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) for organising a pool of matches which will help bridge the gap between domestic and international players. Dravid said that the tour of England was the most important where India A side managed to make a lot of positive moves.

“It has been a good year. Obviously, the tour of England was probably a bonus which you get once in three-four years,” he told Bcci.Tv on the sidelines of the quadrangular series final in Bangalore, where India B beat Australia.

“The A team programme is pretty solid. We’re trying to get as much cricket as we can. For me, it’s a really good step up from the first-class domestic cricket where a lot of these boys play in, and score runs. It’s a good sort of… you can bridge that gap between domestic and international cricket. The quality of cricket is better; we’re playing against an Australia A team here which has got about ten internationals, the South Africans brought a lot of international players. So pretty good opportunity for a lot of these young players who have performed in domestic cricket to test themselves against the slightly better opposition,” he added.

“It also gives selectors an opportunity to see people better, at a slightly elevated level of competition. It’s good for us, the more cricket we play at this level working around the domestic schedule. It’s great,” he added.

Rahul Dravid revealed he has been in constant touch with the national selectors

The former Indian skipper admitted that he has been in contact with the national selectors and often discusses the potential senior side.

However, he stressed the fact that the idea of India A cricket sprang up to develop and enhance the skills of the players and not solely rely on the selection process.

“There is a certain level of communication obviously with the selectors. And obviously they communicate with the Indian team there as well. So we do work, our main aim of A team cricket is to develop good players for the national team,” he explained.

“If the national team is winning then we’re all winning. That’s the whole idea of this thing. So there are times when we’re discussing the kind of players they’re looking for not only in the short term but also in the long term. We see if we can develop those players in the A team. At this level it’s sometimes more about the development,” he remarked.

“To be honest I don’t get into the selection things too much. But yes, the players we see here, we’re happy to chat with them about some of the skills that we as coaches here at the A team level see that they maybe need to step up or work on. We’re happy to give them the opportunity to work on them if we can,” he asserted.

“We’ve had players from the national team come back and play at this level as well which is great. Great for some of our youngsters to interact with them. It also gives them a chance to build up before an important series like the England series or Australia later this year,” he concluded.