The Hindu : Sport : Greg Chappell focussed on the tough task ahead

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Friday, Jun 17, 2005

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Greg Chappell focussed on the tough task ahead

Sports Reporter

RARING TO GO: Greg Chappell spelt out his formula for success after taking charge as the coach of the Indian team. — Photo: K. Bhagya Prakash

BANGALORE: Greg Chappell walked into a packed media hall at the Chinnaswamy Stadium amidst the glare of flashbulbs, and settled into his seat flanked by physio John Gloster and trainer Gregory King. It was Chappell's first day in office as the Indian cricket team coach.

Perhaps the word `focus' must have been uppermost in his mind and it was a word that proved to be his recurring theme in a press conference where Chappell spoke with clarity on issues ranging from team goals to Sourav Ganguly's role.

On his immediate goals, Chappell said, "I am looking forward to the opportunity of working with some of the world's best cricketers and try and see if we can achieve a few things over the next few years. We have a few camps coming up, with a camp for fringe fast bowlers at the end of this month followed by a fitness camp and a cricket camp for the squad going to Sri Lanka."

On captaincy

On captaincy, Ganguly and his loss of form he said, "captaincy is up to the selectors to decide. You pick your best team and you pick your best person as captain. If Sourav is the best man for the job, then he should have it and if he is not then someone else must have it. You will always have players who are out of form, and if you have got players who have been successful over a long period of time then you might well give them more opportunities than somebody else.

"There are not that many players who can succeed at that level, again it is not just about talent, it is about personality, it is about temperament, it is about learning.

"The best players are the ones that learn the fastest and you don't throw out such players lightly, you give them one series, one tour too many rather than one tour too few because they are not that easy to find."

Tendulkar's absence

On Sachin Tendulkar's absence due to surgery the coach said, "the best thing that can happen for Sachin and Indian cricket is for him to get fit. In the meantime we have our jobs to do. It also becomes an opportunity for someone else who may not have got that chance if Sachin wasn't injured and who knows may be we will unearth another champion player."

Chappell spelt out his success formula. "Every country has a different personality but to be successful, I reiterate you have to be focussed, you have to be persistent and you have to be able to keep applying the basics longer and better than the opposition. I have read earlier that concentration is the ability to focus on those things that are important at that moment.

"The beauty of cricket is that things can change. There will be periods when in one session you are on top and in the next the opposition comes back but it is all about being able to absorb that pressure and to keep reasserting that pressure back on the opposition. The one thing I learnt through my playing career about success is that it is more about persevering and persistence than it is about talent. In a contest, the team that is most committed to the basics generally wins. We need to be that team."

"I have an open mind," he said on the process of team selection and the bowling coach slot. "And I would like to sit down with the selectors and discuss some of my philosophies and I am sure they will have some philosophies too.

"If we need a bowling coach then I am happy to have a bowling coach. It is not something I see as being a top priority right at this moment. But from time to time we will call upon experts and I have no problem with that."

On the captain vs coach debate, he said, "a captain and coach need a good working relationship. The coach is involved with the preparation of the team and the planning right till the game starts but really on match day the captain is the main man and the coach has to support the captain as much as possible."

PTI reports:

Chappell also said, "each country has different wickets, different methods to the game to be successful. In some countries, fast bowlers are the best weapon; in some other countries, spinners are the best weapon."

Chappell does not expect difficulty in handling some of the senior players. He said over the years, he had been involved with strong-willed people both as a player, captain and coach. "Generally, you work out the best way to deal with each individual."

Chappell said he had played cricket with some tough and strong-willed people like Dennis Lillee and Jeff Thompson. "All I wanted to do was perform well."

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