Veteran cricket coach Harish Sharma, who guided players like Yuvraj Singh, Dinesh Mongia, VRV Singh, and Siddharth Kaul, has backed the Board of Control for Cricket in India’s (BCCI) strict guidelines for senior men’s team to enforce discipline among squad members following their two consecutive Test series defeats against New Zealand and Australia. Apart from the restrictions on the wives and girlfriends accompanying the players on lengthy tours, the BCCI’s new policy also bars players from engaging in personal shoots or endorsements during ongoing series or tours. Henceforth, the players will also be discouraged from leaving practice sessions early. Participation in BCCI’s official shoots and functions will be mandatory for the players.
“These (restrictions) should have been in place before. When a player is on a task, he should focus on that task. I don’t think players can get busy with family or photo shoots or parties as when we go on tour, our motive is to win on foreign pitches and these things distract them,” Harish Sharma told IANS on Friday. “If you focus on other factors then it will impact your performance,” he added.
Sharma further opined that family should only be allowed to travel with the player when they are on a very long tour as doing otherwise will break their concentration. “When it’s a very long tour then players suffer homesickness and in that case, you can allow (wives and families) but when you go out for a month or so, I don’t think the family is needed as their concentration will shift to them rather than the game,” he said.
As per BCCI guidelines, the players’ partners and children (under 18) will be allowed one visit of up to two weeks per series in case the players are absent from India for more than 45 days.
The veteran coach also highlighted the importance of playing domestic cricket for international stars to gain confidence. The same was reflected by the BCCI in a document that read, “This policy ensures that players remain connected to the domestic cricket ecosystem, fostering talent development, maintaining match fitness, and strengthening the overall domestic structure.”
Sharma added, “Domestic cricket is very important. You can see Karun Nair is playing in the Vijay Hazare Trophy and has scored 752 runs (in 7 innings with 5 centuries). When you play domestic cricket, you get a lot of confidence and match practice.”
“The first thing is discipline, without it players can’t give their 100 percent performance. I was not aware that Gautam Gambhir was travelling with his manager on the tour with the team. If he was travelling with his manager so where was the ICC’s Anti-Corruption Unit? If we’re following that rule in domestic cricket so what is the problem in following that in international cricket,” he signed off.
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