Rahul Dravid and Co. will not be part of Indian ODI coaching staff, NCA staff led by Sitanshu Kotak will take charge

Rahul Dravid was currently coaching the Indian T20I team in South Africa in the three-match T20I series and was expected to remain the coach of the team for the remainder of the South Africa tour which consists of three ODIs and two Test matches.

But in a surprising move, it was announced that Rahul Dravid and his coaching staff including bowling coach Paras Mhambrey and fielding coach T.Dalip will not be a part of the three-match One-Day series and will look after the Indian Test side which is starting from 26th December. It is reported that till then they will oversee the three-day practice match that will take place in Pretoria from December 20 to 22.

In the absence of Rahul Dravid, the NCA coaching staff led by Sitanshu Kotak will take charge of the coaching duties in the One-day set-up. Besides Kotak, Ajay Ratra is appointed as the fielding coach, and Rajib Dutta, affiliated with the NCA, will take on the role of the bowling coach. The first ODI is set to take place in Johannesburg on Sunday, with the subsequent two ODIs planned for Gqeberha on December 19 and Paarl on December 21.

Till now in the absence of Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman was taking the reigns as India’s coach but now a coaching setup has taken the place of absence of the usual coaching staff. This development could be seen as a major shift in Indian cricket as Dravid is keener on focusing only on Test Cricket and if you see it logically then it can be assumed that post-T20 World Cup India could look for a different coaching setup in limited-overs cricket while Dravid may focus only on Test Cricket.

Test contingent has left for South Africa

Meanwhile, the final batch of cricketers en route to South Africa, which includes Virat Kohli, R Ashwin, Jasprit Bumrah, Navdeep Saini, and Harshit Rana, is reported to have commenced their journey. In contrast, Rohit Sharma is anticipated to depart a bit later. He was seen at the annual function of the Dhirubhai Ambani School at BKC in Mumbai on Friday evening. Departing the event midway, it is understood he did so to catch a flight.

While others are expected to arrive late on Friday night, Rohit Sharma may touch down in Johannesburg on Saturday. Additionally, Mohammed Shami and Deepak Chahar have not made the trip to South Africa and have been ruled out of contention for the Test series.