But unlike the stars on the field who are lauded, celebrated and rewarded, the ones off it, the ones who made the success a possibility, choose to remain unknown and keep doing what they do and know best - influence the lives of a several thousand athletes, be it at the grassroot levels or the international stage. One such behind-the-screen superstar who made India’s World Cup dream in 2011 a reality is Ramji Srinivasan, the man who served as the Strength & Conditioning coach of the Indian Cricket Team during their World Cup Triumph in 2011.

“Everybody had an individualized schedule because the players who I was working with were all over thirty; on the other hand, the players today are in their twenties.”

“You cannot compare the fitness levels of a thirty-something-year-old to a mid twenty-year-old. But there are exceptions. Dhoni, for example, can give any youngster a run for his money. And similar Sachin. With 24 years of international cricket under his belt, despite incurring a lot of injuries in his career, he played without flinching till 2013, till the age of 40.”

In fact, the word ‘exception’ was the theme of the speech Srinivasan had given on the stage at the Global Sports Injury Conclave, minutes before he interacted with me and my colleague Bastab during a snack-break at the JW Marriott Hotel in Bengaluru. Srinivasan, in his speech, stressed on how the Federers and Sachins and Dhonis of the world are exceptions and why their bodies should not be considered as the benchmark to judge and treat budding young sportspersons. 

“People need to understand that bowling fitness is different from just general fitness; protocols are different, process is different and the testing methodologies are different. What intensity the bowler is bowling in, only the coaches and captain should decide on those parameters. From a strength & conditioning point of view, we can say whether a player is physiologically fit, but it’s up to the coaches and the captain to say that the player is 100% match fit.

“It’s the coaches job (to decide a player’s fitness). The physio can attest to certain things - whether the bowler is showing any discomfort or if the bowler is bowling at the right intensity. The physio can give a certificate, but it is up to the coach to see if the bowler is able to bowl with 100% efficiency over a period of time and whether he’ll immediately fit into the scheme of things.”

“Each and everybody is like a thumb impression. If somebody is trying to follow Bumrah’s action tomorrow he might have a stress fracture right away, maybe even when he is 14 or 15. One man’s food is another man’s poison. You’ve got to be very careful with the way the players are handled. So if you take someone like a Bumrah, managing him should be very specific and his protocols must be tailor-made for him.”

The world of sport, over the course of the last 20 years, has foreseen a gigantic increase in standards - in terms of fitness and just performance, in general - with athletes shattering records, showing enormous endurance in the process. According to Srinivasan, there is only one factor solely responsible for this astronomic bar-rise. 

“What you’re able to infer from the data is very important. What you infer from the data and how you’re going to execute what you inferred and transfer it onto the athlete successfully over a period of time is where the success lies. And it’s teamwork. It’s not all up to one man. It’s the synergy.”

According to Srinivasan, the injection of science into sport will ensure a constant evolution of athletes, and he believes we’re not far away from the day when we’ll see ambi-dextrous bowlers and batsmen who will do stupendous stuff for a sustained period of time - and excel at it.