Rahul Dravid
Rahul Dravid. (Photo by Ashley Allen/Getty Images)

Rahul Dravid has worked closely with young cricketers in his coaching career and relates a few things to them. National Cricket Academy (NCA) head Rahul Dravid has helped mould the India U-19 cricketers and India A players during his coaching stint and spoke about the insecurities players have at a young age.

Sharing his experience, Dravid said, he has come across numerous players in the U-19 side or India A who think if they will ‘make it or not’. The batting legend often identifies with them as he has also went through a similar time at a young age.

Shubman Gill, Rahul Dravid
Shubman Gill with Rahul Dravid (Credits: Twitter)

“It’s quite unnerving for a lot of young players which is why I love working with the Under-19 boys or India A who I think are going through the same amount of insecurities ‘whether I make it or not’. “I kind of identify with them, that is something I had experienced myself as a young boy,” said Dravid.

“I think trying to get into the Indian team was one of the most challenging phases. I made my first class debut at the age of 17 or so… It took me about five years of first class cricket to play for India. “If I look back, the most complicated time for me would be before when I played for India, when you had those risky decisions to take with doubts and insecurities around,” he recalled.

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Rahul Dravid: You had to sacrifice your education to take up cricket as a career

Rahul Dravid made his debut in first-class cricket as a teenager. From there he took sometime to break into the national team. He said, during the formative years its basically a test of nerves, and making a gamble between education and picking up cricket as a profession with no clarity about the future.

Rahul Dravid
Rahul Dravid. (Credits: Twitter)

“When you had the choices of going down with a career in something else and you commit to cricket and take that risky decision and go through with it.

“You had to sacrifice your education in some ways to take a punt, take a gamble on cricket. It kind of worked out. I never used that degree ever luckily,” he said

Dravid retired with over 13000 Test runs, 10889 runs in ODIs, and one of the finest cricketers to have graced the game. Now when he must look back, Dravid might not have any regrets on picking up cricket over books.