Entire team management and selectors were part of the decision making for No. 4 spot, reveals Sanjay Bangar
Sanjay Bangar, who was recently relieved from his duty of team India's batting coach, has revealed that it was a collective decision from everyone involved to pick the batsman for the No.4 spot. All three of KL Rahul, Vijay Shankar and Rishabh Pant batted at No.4 for the team in the World Cup.
Indian cricket is never short of controversy - be it team selection or dressing room rifts - but arguably, the one thing which has made the most headlines over the course of the last few months is the No.4 spot conundrum, which, staggeringly, still has not been addressed. Months after skipper Virat Kohli gave assurance that Ambati Rayudu would be the team's No.4 in the World Cup, the Hyderabad batter was sensationally dropped for the WC in favour of Vijay Shankar. However, it was in fact KL Rahul who occupied that position in the first game of the WC before Rishabh Pant took his spot after Rahul moved back to the top.
Reflecting on it, former batting coach Sanjay Bangar has revealed that it was a collective decision from everyone involved to chop and change with the No.4 spot.
"The entire team management and selectors were part of the decision making for the No. 4 spot. The choice relied upon current form, fitness criteria, whether he was a left-hander, whether he could bowl, etc," Bangar told Times of India.
Having served as the country's batting coach for no less than five years, Bangar reflected upon the highs of his tenure, where the team ended up winning everything but the World Cup.
"I look back on the progress the team made since 2014 and being No. 1 in Tests for three years in a row with happiness. We won 30 out of 52 Tests played, 13 of them overseas. We also won consistently in ODIs in all countries. The only thing that eluded us was the World Cup," he said.
Under his tenure, all three of Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara scaled new heights as batsmen and Bangar explained the technical tweaks that each batsmen made in order to hone their skills and reduce their vulnerabilities.
"Virat always looks to iron out deficiencies. We worked on his alignments, positioning on the crease, his approach in seaming conditions. Shikhar was initially considered to be an off-side player, he used to stay beside the line of the ball. We worked on how he could get behind the line and open up scoring areas and overcome his dismissals against the short ball.
"With Rohit, we worked on his head position to overcome problems against incoming deliveries from right/left arm angles. In Pujara's case, we worked on reducing the width of his stance and being more upright. It is to their credit that they worked to unlearn old methods," Bangar said.
Bangar, who played 12 Tests and 15 ODIs for India, also credited Ajinkya Rahane for his valuable contributions in the away victories in Australia, South Africa and England, while expressing his happiness over the 31-year-old finally getting the monkey off his back.
"Rahane missed out on converting a lot of 50s into 100s in the last 18 months and contributed in all our overseas victories in Johannesburg, Nottingham and Adelaide. I was happy for him that he eventually crossed the three-figure mark in West Indies, where he played a pivotal role in seaming conditions," he said.