Rahul Dravid
Former India captain and current player Rahul Dravid was there at the pre-match press conference in Chennai yesterday and shared his thoughts on the appointment of the new coach. He said that it would be interesting to catch up with Duncan Fletcher, who has immense international experience and has worked with a lot of international players.
He says that so far he has not had the chance to meet Fletcher one on one but will be doing so to interact with him and to understand his thinking of taking things forward.
Rajasthan Royals, of which Dravid has become a part this year onwards, will be playing a match against Chennai Super Kings on the 4th and the would be hoping to keep their momentum going , after the defeated Pune Warriors on Sunday.
On being asked about what he thought of Ganguly’s inclusion into the Pune Warriors’ side, the 38 year old said, “I am happy for him. He has got the opportunity to play in the IPL like he wanted and I hope it goes well for him.”
Dravid also expressed his happiness to have been given the chance to be playing alongside Warne. He says that he had never “dreamt” or “imagined” that he would be playing alongside someone whom he had once competed “hard” against.
He further says, “We have discussed (the 2001) series over a few times in the course of the last four weeks. Being together so much you know, we’ve discussed a lot of other series too. I really enjoy my time playing under Warne and I think he brings an infectious enthusiasm to our side.” Adding to Warne’s appraisal he said, “He sets very good fields, shows very good leadership. It’s been fun, as I said it’s the beauty of the IPL that you play with some guys you’ve had some fantastic battles with.”
Dravid also elaborated on his views about T20 cricket. He says, “I’ve always been at peace with this format. I think I was totally taken out of context. My comment was that if I was 20 or 21 year old, I would’ve looked at this format and realised there’s a future in this format and this was something I needed to master.”
He added, “It’s just that for lot of us this format came at a later stage. It was like 50 overs. When I was 20- 21, I knew that I’d have to well in 50 overs because it was going to play a significant part in my life. Any kid today who is 20- 21 has got to recognise the fact that T20 is going to be a significant part of his life whether he likes it or not… I always liked this format. I get to travel across the country, share the dressing room with great players. I also enjoy the fact that it seems to capture the imagination of the country for six weeks, which is nice for a domestic tournament to be able to do that.”
Tags: Coach, Cricket, Duncan Fletcher, India, Indian Cricket, Indian Premier League, IPL, Rahul Dravid, T20 Cricket
