By Neena Bhandari, IANS
Sydney : As the Indian cricket team infused with fresh blood wins matches, `Guru Greg’, in an hour-long documentary telecast Thursday night on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, reveals how the former India coach championed for youth in a team built around experience, but was “actively resisted”.
Chappell says in the documentary, “We tried to change it to move away from an old-based team, to get some youth and some young legs and some strong arms into the team as well as some good batting and bowling. But unfortunately it’s been resisted, actively resisted from within the team and without. So, we’re going to finish up with an old team going to the World Cup. On paper it looks good but I’m not sure it’s going to get the results the people of India want.”
Featuring candid conversations with Greg Chappell, and his wife Judy, the documentary provides a rare insight, tracing Chappell’s journey as the Indian coach, which begins with a dream, but ends in tragedy.
“To be quite honest, if there is not an intention of change there’s not much point myself, or any of the other coaches for that matter, getting involved. It’s very difficult to keep putting wallpaper over the cracks. The cracks have got big and the structure needs to be dealt with,” says Chappell.
Among the many frustrations, Chappell talks of how he was informed of Saurav Ganguly’s inclusion in the Test team by a journalist, and while they were preparing for the South Africa series, he was separated from his coaching staff with the office moving to Lands End.
Chappell bares his heart on the tumultuous spell as coach. The enormous pressures he faced from all quarters – the Board of Control for Cricket in India, the players, media corporations, the fans and from his own expectations, especially prior to the World Cup.
He couldn’t understand cricketers, who were more interested in personal success than team triumph. For the Australian cricket icon, the team as a unit was more important than any individual.
Chappell says that Indian cricket needs a media manager, as at any given time hundreds of journalists are demanding one-to-one interviews.
During this tough tenure, Chappell’s family was encouraging and supportive of this great challenge he took to try something little bit different. They did think that he was “sometimes little bit mad” to take it on.
His wife says in the documentary, “Greg is consumed with cricket. He is dreaming cricket, his mind is always away on the job. He loves it and finds it an exciting challenge, but I have to admit, it doesn’t give much time to us.”
Chappell agrees that it is a physically and mentally demanding job and there is not much time for personal life. “In the last 12 months, I have spent 322 days in hotel rooms.”
Chappell also claims that the fan assault on him in Orissa was a racist attack. “I got hit on the side of the head and my immediate reaction was he’s broken my jaw. Indians are very quick to complain about racism. There are plenty of Indian cricketers the guy could have attacked but he chose to attack me. I don’t really buy the fact that he was talking about the lack of Orissa players in the Indian team.”
“If that was the case, why didn’t he accost the chairman of selectors or someone else who might have been involved in the selection process? Why would he attack one of the foreigners in the group – me as coach? There’s a bit more to it than that,” Chappell said.
As Indians prepare to clash with the Australians in another acrimonious Test match series beginning in Melbourne on Boxing day (Dec 26), the Guru Greg’s mantra, `Perform or perish’, will hold true.