Former South African all-rounder Lance Klusener believes the Indian cricket is missing the trick by not allowing their youngsters to play foreign cricket leagues.
The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) still doesn’t allow the Indian cricketers to play the foreign cricket leagues like Australian Big Bash League or England’s T20 Blast etc. Klusener feels the Indian cricket will improve their performances outside the sub-continent if the youngsters experience with the top foreign leagues.
Klusener said, “I really think they are missing a trick by not allowing youngsters in India to travel and play in such tournaments. Because the exposure they are going to get there will be enormous. Just imagine, you have a youngster with the experience of playing in the Big Bash, and when he gets picked to represent India in Australia, neither the conditions nor those big grounds will be alien to him.”
Currently, Klusener is the senior consultant coach of Delhi cricket team for the limited-overs cricket (Vijay Hazare Trophy and Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy). In the very short time, the former South African all-rounder is enjoying his new job.
Talking about his experience with the new job, Klusener said, “It’s been barely a week now, and I’m feeling my way in.”
Earlier, he was the mentor of India Premier League (IPL) team Mumbai Indians and Tamil Nadu Premier League (TNPL) team Kovai Kings. Klusener claims that coaching in India is the ultimate for him due to the country offers the huge amount of cricketing talent.
Klusener said, “For me, coaching in India is the ultimate. One of the things I like about India is the amount of talent that’s on offer and response from the players is fantastic. That’s why I say this is the best cricketing nation. So, when Rahul Sanghvi called me and offered this role, I couldn’t refuse it.”
Talking about the present Delhi squad, Klusener has found one interesting similarity with Dolphins’ (a South African domestic team) cricketers, where Klusener was the head coach from 2012 to 2016.
Klusener said, “These guys (Delhi) are reluctant to play the conventional sweep shot. Years back, even the Dolphins batters faced the same problem. But you could sympathise with them because they had not faced a lot of spinners back home. If you play the sweep shot, the captain will move a fielder to square-leg. This opens up the field and improves the batsmen’s chances of scoring in other
