Domestic Diary: Curious case of Ranji's journeymen coaches

One of Australia's finest ever captain Ian Chappell never ever believed that a professional cricket team needs a specialist coach.

"An international 'coach' is something the Australian team travels in around England," is one of Chappell's iconic pun-intended quote on what he exactly thought about cricket coaches.

Back in India though, coaching senior teams -- from international to IPL is a well-paid job, not discounting the glamour which is associated with it.

But reality bites when one climbs down -- just a notch below at the first-class level where it's not always a bed of roses for all those plying their trade.
 

There one can would find a bunch of journeymen coaches -- extremely sincere, can read the pulse of state teams, know what is required to do well at the Ranji Trophy level but never getting the credit that is due.

Even when most of them know that next level may never beckon them, they happily accept reality and carry on with their job delivering results.

Till the apathy and high handedness of state association officials hits them with a sense of insecurity creeping into their system.

Take the example of K Sanath Kumar, one of the more successful journeyman coaches of domestic cricket. After an uneventful first-class career for Karnataka (11 matches), the 53-year-old Sanath Kumar started coaching.

He has coached a high-profile Karnataka team, Baroda which consists of Pathan brothers Irfan and Yusuf and during last season, he was with the Assam Ranji team.

The crowning glory of Kumar's coaching career would certainly be guiding a bunch of minnows from Assam to the semi-final of the Ranji Trophy last season -- first in the history of the north-eastern state.

But instead of getting kudos for his effort with a young team, Kumar got a taste of how officials in state associations, who have never played the game, treat support staff.

"For domestic coaches, it is important that when you are delivering results and are in circulation, you make right moves. After guiding Assam, I had at least three good offers from other states but decided to stay back on insistence of the players with whom I had grown a kind of affinity," Kumar recalled during his chat with PTI.

But then certain strange things happened with change of guard at the Assam Cricket Association (ACA).

"When I met them for a renewal of contract, the least I could expect is same salary as last year if not a hike. One of the Assam CA officials told me: 'Look Ranji Trophy is no benchmark. The actual cricket is one dayers and T20. What are you doing to improve the team's standard in those aspects'," Kumar recalled the conversation.