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Twitter goes crazy after coach Rahul Dravid leads India's first training session in Sri Lanka
Rahul Dravid was named as the head coach of the side for the Sri Lanka tour as regular coach Ravi Shastri is currently in England with the Test side. Here is how Twitter reacted after Dravid’s first training session as coach.
Twitterati could not keep calm after seeing the legendary Rahul Dravid taking charge of the young Indian side in their first training session in Sri Lanka on Friday.
BCCI shared images of India’s training session on its official Twitter handle. The Indian team completed its mandatory quarantine period after landing in Sri Lanka last week.
Dravid was named as the head coach of the side for the three-match ODI series beginning on July 13, followed by 3 T20Is.
India’s regular head coach Ravi Shastri is currently in England with the Test side which is gearing up for the match-series against England starting on August 4.
BCCI had decided to name two different Indian teams to play in different formats at the same time in Sri Lanka and England.
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The Test regulars including captain Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami were not included for the Sri Lanka series while Shikhar Dhawan was named captain of a young Indian limited-overs side that has as many as six fresh faces.
Dravid, who was at the helm of India A and India U19 teams before taking over as the head of cricket operations at the National Academy of Bengaluru, was given charge of the Sri Lanka tour.
Here is how Twitter reacted after Dravid’s first training session as India coach
These six white-ball fixtures to be played at the R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo will be India’s last limited-overs matches before the T20 World Cup in October—November in UAE and Oman this year. While many believe this is an ideal opportunity to give chances to all the young cricketers vying for a spot in India’s T20I side, Dravid said it won’t be possible.
Dravid said the primary objective will be to try and win the series.
"...I think it's probably going to be unrealistic to expect us in a short tour like this with three games, or three one-dayers to give everyone an opportunity...and the selectors will be there as well," Dravid had said in the pre-departure press conference.
"There are a lot of people in this squad who are pushing for places or looking to cement their places in the World Cup coming up, but I think the key goal of everyone in the squad is to try and win the series," the former India captain said.
"The primary objective is to try and win the series and hopefully people get the opportunity to put in some really good performances. These are the only three games before the World Cup. I am sure that you know the selectors and management would have a pretty fair idea by now as to what is the kind of squad that they are looking for," he said.
India’s squad for Sri Lanka tour: Shikhar Dhawan (Captain), Prithvi Shaw, Devdutt Padikkal, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Suryakumar Yadav, Manish Pandey, Hardik Pandya, Nitish Rana, Ishan Kishan (Wicket-keeper), Sanju Samson (Wicket-keeper), Yuzvendra Chahal, Rahul Chahar, K Gowtham, Krunal Pandya, Kuldeep Yadav, Varun Chakravarthy, Bhuvneshwar Kumar (Vice-captain), Deepak Chahar, Navdeep Saini, Chetan Sakariya
Net Bowlers: Ishan Porel, Sandeep Warrier, Arshdeep Singh, Sai Kishore, Simarjeet Singh
