Hello and welcome to Stumped, your intercontinental hit of news, features, and debate
from the quirky world of cricket. I'm Eleanor Oldroyd in London, still in the depths of the
northern hemisphere winter and getting severe envy for all of my friends who are jetting off around
the world for different series. Some are going to New Zealand with the England men's Test team, some
are already in India with the Australian men's Test team, and some are going to South Africa
for the Women's T20 World Cup as well. But hey, I've got a train to Manchester later on today,
so who needs international jet setting! I hope it all goes well Elly. It's very quiet here in
Sydney, it's been boiling hot. We've had a massive storm; cars have been washed off the street,
but I don't think it's raining much in India and that's where most of the Australian cricket eyes
are focused at the moment. Well it is raining in India for the Indian spinners! They're picking
up wickets by the buckets! Hello everybody, this is Charu Sharma for All India Radio. I'm
glad to be back in Bangalore where I'm od-ing on golf because my club, the KG, has got a league
going. This is golf, golf, golf all the time. Well it's lovely to have you all with us and
I'm sure we'll be reflecting a lot on the Border Gavaskar Trophy on weeks to come on Stumped. We
are kind of semi watching that first innings as we record the show this morning here in the UK.
But first on Stumped, we're going to take a deep dive into the heart of the India dressing room.
It's not often you get a glimpse into the mind of top players like Virat Kohli and MS Dhoni,
but our first guest worked alongside them every day. He spoke to them regularly and he was privy
to high level conversations, the details of which have never previously been reported.
I'm delighted to say we're joined by the former India fielding coach R Shridar. Good morning, hello Shri, welcome to Stumped.
Good morning, Eleanor, good morning James good evening for you I'm
sorry if you're in Sydney, and obviously good afternoon to Charu on the show, it's a pleasure
to be to be here on BBC Stumped. You've just released this book, it's called
"Coaching Beyond: My Days with the Indian National Cricket Team". I mean congratulations on the book;
it's made quite a stir already. What made you write it? What made you decide to write it?
I don't know I've been thinking about that what made me write it. I think it was just
a trigger at some point after I finished that I should probably let the world know about the
seven years I was with the Indian team, what made this team fearless, what made that team
as five years back-to-back number one Test team in the world - it was from 2016 to 2020,
India was a number one Test team in the world - and what made the Kohli Shastri era tick. The
kind of fearless an honest cricket which they played, of course, they didn't win an ICC trophy,
but some of the cricket we played at that time was quite exhilarating. So, I thought it would
be a good idea to let the readers, or let the coaches, aspiring young cricketers, cricket fans,
give them an anecdotal view of how the whole thing went about and how the Kohli Shastri era
instilled fearlessness into the Indian players and what champions are made of. I thought it was
an opportunity for me to communicate to upcoming coaches, upcoming cricketers in a storytelling way.
It's made headlines around the world already hasn't it, the book, particularly in India not
surprisingly perhaps. You've given us amazing detail into certain incidents which happened
around that seven-year period. Are you surprised by the reaction that it's had, by the level of
interest that it's had? Totally surprised. I never expected it. I just wanted it to be kind
of a book to leave back something, you know, and I did not expect the interest the book has generated.
I have a view to it. Obviously some of interest has not gone down well very well with me, because
what I intended to write and what has come out is totally different because nowadays you see on
social media people looking for instant greatness or instant fame; they don't read the entire book
and don't understand the context of the book before passing judgement. Unfortunately, we live
in this era and it was an error of judgement from my side. I didn't take that into consideration,
I just wrote it very honestly and fearlessly like the culture of the Indian team when I was with the
team - being honest and fearless - but I wrote it with a lot of passion, without berating anyone,
without being disparaging to anyone. People will get the real context of it and certain things were written without reading
the whole context, which I'm sad about but otherwise I'm very glad that the book has created and generated a lot of interest.
Jim Maxwell, Shri. Just talking about your connection with the Indian team, you came aboard about the same time as Ravi
Shastri did as coach. Tell us about working with him and the impact he had on the Indian side.
I think it's been enormous, because my entire seven years obviously I had one year with
Anil Kumble as the head coach, but the remaining six years has all been under Ravi Shastri,
who I think has made a huge impact in my career in my coaching career at least. He's the kind of
personality that is a towering personality that Ravi is, and in my opinion, he's made a huge
impact on the way this team plays. Obviously, Ravi is a very very good tactician of the game.
His decision-making skills are unbelievable, and everyone knows, as I mentioned in the book,
about his man management skills and his ability to get the best out of each one in his own way.
What stood out most and what I learned most by being beside Ravi through those seven years
is integrity. Ravi, I think, is a man of extreme integrity another thing about him is there's no
agenda, absolutely no agenda, in my opinion. He was loyal to Indian cricket, and he was always
looking at what is the best thing I can do to get Indian cricket ahead. So that was a great
learning for me. For most of this book, it is a tribute to the Kohli Shastri era.
Just a little bit more on is his style, his method. Apparently, he wasn't scared of raising his voice, tell us
about the time MS Dhoni felt his wrath after he scored his 10,000th ODI run against England at Lord's.
Ravi Shastri wanted the Indian team to play in a certain way and he made no bones about it.
He didn't mind the team losing, but he wanted a certain brand of cricket this
Indian team should play, whether we win or lose. He was fair and to express that another
fact that stood out was he treated everyone the same. As human beings,
we like one person more than the other but he treated everyone same in the team so that was the
point I was trying to impress in that particular instance. And on the score of the famous MS Dhoni,
tell us a bit more about how you found out about his retirement before anyone else appeared to?
It was it was the second day of this semi-final as remember it and I was at the breakfast table very
early and MS joined in, and since I was sitting alone they joined in and there was a conversation
going on and it is heard that conversation about what I have written and when MS said what he said,
I almost felt like jumping across the table and giving him a hug and falling at his feet for the
kind of emotion that he's got for this country, him being an army personnel from the para regiment
I should say the devotion and love his got for his country shone through the day with that comment of
what he said. You do not want to miss that bus journey in case we get to Lord's on that on
that night. He did not want to miss that bus journey because it could be his last and my
respect for him only grew multi fold once I heard that, but I was so scared to even speak about it
with anyone. I just zipped up and went on with it and eventually he announced his retirement after a couple of years.
Shri, hi. This is Charu Sharma, I'm up in Bangalore. Congratulations on the book I
look forward to reading it and of course for all the good work you've done for the Indian team,
especially with fielding standards but more that later. Let's move onto his replacement,
Kohli that is, and he's an absolute superstar that we know but in terms of personality,
very aggressive and a lot of people love that somebody does raise very controversy. In your
opinion, how was he in the dressing room as an individual? Look, he was outstanding,
whether he was just a player or right through the years he was a captain, he's someone who inspired
everyone to give their best. He walked the talk. Ravi brought the best out of him in my opinion
and he brought out the fearlessness in Virat. You can see that by the way the Indian team
toured Australia during their partnership. The way India played in Australia to me to exemplifies the
Kohli Shastri partnership; how fearless as they were when they toured Australia. Virat Kohli
in the dressing room was someone who everybody looked up to. His work ethic was unbelievable.
I always say that it's a given template for any young cricketer to just see. If you have a work
ethic like that and you can't do too much wrong, you won't be far away from achieving
your best self. That's the kind of template he had; you know. Whether it was practise,
whether it was taking care of his diet, whether it was his training, whether it was his recovery,
everything. That kind of dedication he had to do everything about his cricket
was unbelievable and whether he scores runs or not, the kind of energy he gave away on the field
was unbelievable. He didn't ever leave a drop of energy back on the field when he came back
into the dressing room at 5:30 or whatever time that was. He was an unbelievable and ultimate
example. Kohli is just not a leader, in India Kohli is a movement. How did the team you,
Ravi, Kohli and everybody handle fielding lapses and missed catches? Was there a lot of criticism
thereafter, or did you take it well it's alright it happens in the game ? Surely not?
I feel we handled it well because in international cricket if you play a 5-game series on the road, you will
have one poor game on the field as a team as an average - it is a given. Like I say always in many
of my fielding seminars, you show me one fielder who's not dropped a catch and I'll show you God.
Everyone makes mistakes on the field, but we always tried and help the players try and
separate their primary skill from the fielding, which is always the secondary skill. We help them
separate it mentally because sometimes you end up thinking about your primary skill even when
you're fielding, and that's when the concentration lapse happens. It is human, it is going to happen
to every athlete or every cricketer, but we help them try and separate that. We try and help the
athletes be in the impact phase of fielding, rather than being the deficit phase to help
each cricketer try and identify those different phases while they are on the field and getting to
the impact phase whenever they realise that they are falling into a deficit phase. Practise again,
different conditions, different methods we gotta keep it going. Being there for seven years,
you've got to be inventive and creative and keep the practise sessions enjoyable and creative and
interesting as well. So we tried our best we can I don't know if we succeeded or not, but yeah
we tried our best with them. So Shri, when you look back on your time as India's fielding
coach, what do you feel? I think deeply gratitude to Ravi Shastri and Virat Kohli and
MS Dhoni, the BBCI of course for having the trust in me to allow me to do my role for as long as seven years,
close to 300 games. I would have given my right hand if somebody told me way back in 2015
that you'd do 7 years, give me your right hand, I would have said 'happily, please take it.' So I'm deeply
in gratitude to all of them and it is probably a phase of life which gave me a recognition.
If I'm on the BBC, it's because of that phase. I won't be on BBC otherwise, so a deep sense of gratitude.
Well, Shri, it's been a pleasure to have you with us and thank you so much for
joining us on Stumped, and very best of luck to you. It's been an absolute pleasure to be
on BBC. Thank you very much Eleanor, thank you Jim, thank you my good old friend Charu, wish
you all the best and a pleasure to be on the BBC. Thank you. Well next on Stumped, when India play
Pakistan the world of cricket grinds to a halt. It's one the most intense and fierce sporting
rivalries in the world and often it lives up to the billing. Well this weekend, the two countries
meet for their first game of the Women's T20 World Cup in South Africa. Earlier this week I caught up
with the Pakistan all-rounder Nida Dar and I asked what these matches meant to her.
Definitely it's a different scenario whenever we play against India and definitely with all wishes from the
country and from the family and the friends for playing against India is different. Definitely,
I hope for the best that we are playing really well against them. Before that, we had a match
against India in the Asia Cup, and we won that and definitely everyone now wishes for another win.
When you won that game in the Asia Cup, what was the reaction like? Can you just sum up the
excitement of beating India? Definitely it was a great honour for me as well because I was the
match winner at that time, and we needed to win at that moment. In the Asia Cup, it's a big event,
so we were very excited for the match and my mother was always saying to me you need to step
up against India and you need to perform well. Definitely after the match, we actually weren't
that against India, so everyone was cherishing us, everyone saying yeah this is this is your time,
come on girls you can do it, so it was a really amazing feeling at that time.
I'm sure you could do with a win, you had quite a difficult series against Australia this last month.
Yes, we have a very good practise matches and we had a very good practise against Australia, definitely
we're actually lost matches but we actually experimented a lot of things against them.
We know how we can go with a new strategy and the plan. It is a very big given like World Cup,
so definitely we should have stepped up and go for the win. Can you tell us about your new strategy,
or is this something you're keeping secret? It is secret and we'll show you in the matches.
You had some great performances in 2022 and you were named part of the ICC's T20 international team of
the year - the only Pakistan player to be in that group alongside some great players from Australia
and around the world as well. What did that mean to you personally and to your family?
It's a great honour for me to be nominated as a cricketer of the year in the T20s, so
it's definitely an honour. But, the thing is it's always a boost for me and given me that challenge
that you can do it better for the team, and yes definitely it's not a tag for me but I
don't want any extra pressure for the World Cup. I just want to deliver whatever I have.
It's been a pleasure talking to you Nida, thank you very much indeed for your time and very best of luck
over next few weeks. Well, that was the Pakistan all-rounder Nida Dar and the Women's T20 World Cup
gets underway in South Africa this weekend. Charu, thank you very much indeed. Jim, it's a pleasure
as always to see you and that is just about it for this week Stumped. Join us again next time.