How long can India stay away from split coaching?

It’s an increasing reality of the times that the BCCI hasn’t quite warmed up to despite a wealth of Indian coaches

A change of guard is imminent at two very important leadership levels within Indian cricket. Stepping down after the T20 World Cup, Rahul Dravid may not overstay an already extended welcome. Also slim are the chances of Rohit Sharma holding on to the all-format captaincy. Only Jasprit Bumrah walks into the team in all three formats but with his name comes an overbearing rider of workload management that is bound to nudge the BCCI into considering splitting the captaincy.

Rahul Dravid's current tenure as India's head coach will end after T20 World Cup. (PTI)

If that’s how things stand now, is that day far when coaching too could go the same way?

It’s not a new concept by any means. England first split their coaching between Andy Flower and Ashley Giles from 2012 to 2014 but it didn’t work out. Brendon McCullum and Mathew Mott’s appointments since 2022, however, have yielded more than favourable results. South Africa and West Indies too have divided duties, with Pakistan too recently splitting roles between Gary Kirsten (white-ball) and Jason Gillespie.

It’s a landmark development as subcontinent teams are often perceived to be more apprehensive towards the idea of having multiple decision-makers within the same setup.

With Pakistan breaking that glass ceiling however, it remains to be seen how long India postpone an inevitable introspection, purely because of their trickier management of white-ball cricket. To let the conversation drift to a point where change seemed inevitable for the 2022 T20 World Cup, only for India to not touch the top-three, is exactly the kind of tangle that warranted more nuanced handling.

Learning to bat quicker at the top, attacking the middle overs, and playing instinctively more than relying on matchups is a mental rewiring that can’t be assimilated from the IPL alone. Someone must be in charge of drilling it into the system too.

Not to forget a massive transition will be upon the Indian team soon. Even if Sharma and Virat Kohli choose to play Tests, they can’t possibly continue beyond the 2025 Test Championship cycle, post which KL Rahul could be asked to step up to lead. Bumrah is expected to be allowed to pick his battles. Ravindra Jadeja too is 35.

Left with a mostly young white-ball unit, this year is ideal for India to finally be in sync with England with Australia who have long adopted a horses-for-courses approach. With the international schedules also showing no sign of reducing any time soon, split coaching can only help make the ecosystems more streamlined.

Jay Shah, the BCCI secretary, however has recently said that the board isn’t in favour of splitting coaching roles. And the reluctance is understandable. Ever since Duncan Fletcher, the conversation has always pivoted on having an Indian coach who could connect to a greenhorn as easily as he does with senior players.

To that effect, the BCCI has also been working on creating a tier of homegrown coaches handpicked from a selection of former cricketers.Topping that list is VVS Laxman—second in command to Dravid in the coaching structure but a tier by himself—who has coached an IPL franchise as well, and it’s pretty obvious why the BCCI doesn’t want to change direction after putting in a decade to creating a supply line of homegrown coaches.

For the record, BCCI had the choice to split coaching roles in 2015, primarily because they weren’t getting anyone willing to join full-time. But the situation has changed. To split the coaching now, that too between two Indians, shouldn’t seem far-fetched, especially since Laxman has already taken charge a few times when Dravid had to go home. Dravid too had auditioned for the role in similar fashion, when in 2021 he was asked to coach the white-ball side in Sri Lanka when the Test team—coached by Ravi Shastri—was in England.

Keeping all that in perspective, indulge in the split coaching scenario again and the possibilities seem endless. At the top of the pile is Gautam Gambhir, whose no-nonsense ‘team-before-individuals’ mentorship is clearly working wonders at Kolkata Knight Riders this IPL. Ashish Nehra, the brains behind Gujarat Titans’ phenomenal start to the IPL, is tipped as one of the sharpest minds in the business. Sanjay Bangar has been there and done that. Venkatesh Prasad too is another worthy contender. These are the first names that come to mind, only if the BCCI wants to go off a well-trodden path. And that’s a big if.