Relive ESPNcricinfo’s ball-by-ball commentary as Australia seal a 4-0 series win

ESPNcricinfo staff16-Jan-202216.1, Green to Burns, OUT
Chopped on! Australia have the breakthrough and it’s a familiar type of dismissal for Burns, on the stroke of tea/dinner. Angling in from around the wicket, unsure whether to play or leave. He opts for the latter, but too late to get his bat out of the way, and he only manages to deflect it onto his own stumps! Green strikes, England’s highest opening stand of the series is broken.
20.5, Green to Malan, OUT
Brilliant bowling! This has been outstanding from Green. It’s an inside edge in the end, but Malan has been worked over. Short of a length from round the wicket, Malan is late bringing his bat down and it deflects into the stumps.
Dawid Malan chops onto his own stumps•CA/Cricket Australia/Getty Images22.2, Green to Crawley, OUT
Edged, gone! Magical spell from Green. Full at off stump, lures the drive and Carey dives to his right to grab a neat one.
27.5, Starc to Stokes, OUT
Taken at deep square leg! Superb catch running in from Lyon. Starc dropped in the short ball and Stokes went after it. He didn’t try to keep it down. Lyon makes good ground in off the rope and takes it diving forward.
Stokes departs, Cummins and Starc celebrate•AFP/Getty Images31.4, Boland to Root, OUT
Keeps low, smashes into off stump! Root doesn’t hit a single ball with his new bat after drinks. This is a real grubber, shooting through low and crashing into the bottom of the stump, underneath the toe-end of his bat. Root’s series is over, another without a hundred in Australia. Not much he could have done about that one!
Root loses his off stump to a shooter•AFP/Getty Images

If England are quick they could still make Djokovic’s flight.

— Daniel Cherny (@DanielCherny) January 16, 2022

The batter laid into Natarajan and went on a boundary-hitting spree to give Sunrisers the jitters

Vishal Dikshit18-May-20222:01

Vettori: Tim David should bat at No. 4 for Mumbai

There are a few things that make Tim David a big and powerful hitter of the ball. One is his height. Another is his strong base at the crease. And two abilities he has worked on over the last few years are his “freakish” hand speed and hand-eye coordination.It was no surprise then that he was snapped up by Mumbai Indians for INR 8.25 crore (USD 1.1 million approx) at the mega auction in February purely for his six-hitting. The surprise came during the IPL. After giving him just two chances, in which he scored 12 and 1 at the start of the season, Mumbai dropped David from the XI. Mumbai and their captain Rohit Sharma are known to give their players a long rope before dropping them which made this move even more baffling.Related

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David, however, waited out for his next chance as Mumbai lost one game after another. He might have been prepared for such a scenario because of the stiff competition overseas players face for a spot in the XI, and David used the time to hone his power-hitting further.”I was sitting out after the first couple of games and during that period it was an opportunity to train really hard, do as much work as I can in the nets and in the gym, bowling and be ready for when an opportunity came,” David said a day before the game against Sunrisers Hyderabad. “It’s an opportunity to get used to the conditions and see how other teams are stacking up, what is effective in these conditions in the IPL. So that was a good period for me to work really hard and get ready to come back in the team when that opportunity came.”The opportunity came after nearly a month by when Mumbai had lost all their eight games. He scored a couple of unbeaten knocks, struck four sixes in his 44 not out off 21 against Gujarat Titans, but the innings that really showcased his prowess came on Tuesday against Sunrisers.2:45

Tim David: ‘I spend a lot of time in the nets trying to hit sixes’

He came in to walk when Mumbai needed 67 off 35 in a chase of 194. In the 18 balls he faced, he struck three fours that weren’t as spectacular, but he laid into T Natarajan in the 18th over when Mumbai needed 45 from 18.On the first ball, David planted his strong base in front of the stumps and clubbed Natarajan’s full toss with a big swing of the arms over long-off. Two balls later, Natarajan missed another yorker, this time on middle, and David swung him square for another six. Next ball Natarajan tried a yorker again but ended up bowling another full toss and David dispatched him over square leg again, this time raising the decibel level further at Wankhede. Natarajan went for the blockhole yet again next ball and David smoked him over long-on for a monstrous six, the second biggest of IPL 2022, at 114 metres.”I spend a lot of my time in the nets trying to hit sixes,” David had said in a virtual press conference before the match. “It’s about putting pressure on the bowler and recognising the right situations for when you can try that in a game. There might be different pitches or grounds that suit power hitting for particular bowlers, you got to pick those moments. It’s about maintaining confidence for the season and trusting your ability which you can get through training, lots of practice, make sure you’re hitting the ball well and you can take that into the game and be fresh-minded.”How much of mental preparation comes in power hitting then? “You do all your work outside of the game in the nets and in the gym to make sure you’re feeling strong, and you are hitting the ball well, and then once it’s in the game it’s all mental if you’re…I think it’s the same for all batters, you’ve got to go in clear-minded. If you don’t, if you’re carrying things into the game, it often impacts your performance. So it’s trying to get into that state where you can try and be as consistent as possible mentally and then if you trust your process and stick to it then it will most often bring the best results.”David’s team-mate Ishan Kishan said at the post-match press conference that David puts in a lot of work behind his game.”He makes sure that he’ll hit the ball according to where it pitches,” Kishan said. “He speaks to the coaches also about it. The best part is he’s not someone who mainly hits to the leg side or only targets a certain kind of ball. He’s good on the back foot, he has very good power. So even if bowlers miss their yorkers, he’s very good at converting them into sixes.”Despite bringing the equation down to a gettable 19 off 13, David ran himself out when he tried to steal a single by bunting the last ball of the over back to Natarajan, who did well to take the bails off at the non-striker’s end to catch David short. With David gone, Mumbai also fell short, but after witnessing whom they had invested the 8.25 crore in.

Seventeen-year old who hit a match-winning, 36-ball fifty against South Africa says she’s just “kind of doing my thing”

Valkerie Baynes02-Aug-2022We all long, at some point, for our childhood days when fear was an alien concept and we dived into whatever we were doing with no inhibitions.So it’s impossible not to feel a pang of envy watching Alice Capsey bat with all the courage in the world to set the foundation for yet another England victory over South Africa which put the host nation on the cusp of the Commonwealth Games knockout stages in Birmingham.A savage-looking black eye suffered moments before England’s first-up victory over Sri Lanka? Worse than it looks, apparently. Facing the fire and pace of Shabnim Ismail? No problem, just walk down the pitch to her. A half-century in your third international innings? Child’s play.Capsey’s seamless transition to the senior ranks could not have come at a better time with Heather Knight, the England captain, yet to make an appearance at the Commonwealth Games because of a hip injury that has her in doubt for the final group game against New Zealand on Thursday.Acting captain Nat Sciver said after England’s 26-run victory over South Africa at Edgbaston that Knight had undergone further scans on the injury she suffered during the first T20I between the sides during their bilateral series on July 21.”She’s not in a good place,” Sciver said. “She’s better than she has been in the last few days, still in a bit of pain with her hip.”It’s probably going to be a bit quick to play against New Zealand. She went and saw our team doctor and had another scan. She’s waiting on the results of that.”Capsey, meanwhile, reached her maiden international half-century in 36 deliveries on Tuesday and then fell on the next ball she faced, spooning a return catch Nonkululeko Mlaba.Hers was the second of three England wickets to fall for five runs in the space of nine balls as they slumped to 94 for 5. But then an unbroken 73-run partnership off just 43 balls from the vastly experienced Katherine Brunt and Amy Jones set South Africa a target of 168 before England’s bowlers restricted them to 141 for 4. It was England’s seventh victory over South Africa in a white-ball match this summer.”It just ticks off a landmark, doesn’t it?” Capsey said of her fifty. “But in the game, it’s not really about that, it was more just setting myself a platform to try and push on for the team, which unfortunately, I didn’t.Alice Capsey gave the England innings momentum after they lost their openers early•Getty Images”But you saw the brilliance of Jonesy and Katherine coming in at the end and putting on a real show for the crowd, which was amazing to watch.”Capsey, who wasn’t required to bat in her debut match, England’s second T20I against South Africa in Worcester, got her chance in the third match of that series in Derby and smashed four consecutive fours on her way to 25 off 17.After passing a fitness test in the immediate aftermath of copping a ball to the face during the warm-up for England’s Commonwealth Games opener against Sri Lanka, she scored 44 at just over a run-a-ball to top score in a five-wicket victory.While she said her vision had been impaired somewhat during that knock as her eye swelled up while she was batting, Capsey said she didn’t feel any other ill effects and, by the time Tuesday’s match rolled round, it looked worse than it felt on account of the bruise coming out.”Everyone kind of expected some concussion symptoms to start to grow over the next couple of days, however I’ve been absolutely fine which for me, that’s perfect, it’s allowing me still to play and kind of do my thing,” Capsey said.”I’ve felt in really good touch, especially coming into the South Africa series as well, so it [reaching fifty] was a real positive for me and I’ve really enjoyed the role that they’ve given me.”I feel quite comfortable and I know what I’m doing, it’s great to come into the team and for them to trust me with that role.”In Derby, Sciver had told Capsey she would come in at No. 3 if an early wicket fell. As it happened, opener Sophia Dunkley was out for a first-ball duck and Capsey has held her place since.This time, Ismail, Capsey’s Hundred team-mate at Oval Invincibles, removed Dunkley for 1 with her first delivery, an excellent yorker on the seventh ball of the match. When Ismail returned in the sixth over, she had Dunkley’s opening partner, Danni Wyatt, caught behind by Sinalo Jafta for 27 from 20 balls.Her next delivery was back-of-a-length and steered through third by Sciver for a single before she unleashed a short ball which Capsey failed to connect with as she attempted to pull. Then, as calm as you like, Capsey advanced on the next one and dispatched it over cover to the boundary.”Me and Shabs are are good mates so it was a bit of a cat and mouse that over,” Capsey said. “It’s the adrenaline, I think, for me, also being smart with my options.”She bowled a bouncer so you kind of can guess what’s coming. But it’s just about being brave and I think that’s kind of the message that we really got from the coaching staff and Nat and Heather.”As for being part of a bigger, multi-sport event where women’s cricket is making its Commonwealth games debut, Capsey was all about soaking up he experience.”My family’s come to every game, which has been lovely,” she said. “For me, it’s just about taking everything in, really enjoying it. It’s such a rare occasion that you’ve just got to make the memories.”

Don’t forget, the pair does not comprise the totality of concerns raised by the hearings; to benefit from the process, South African cricket must delve into a lot more

Firdose Moonda12-May-2022South African cricket’s relationship with race does not start or end with Graeme Smith and Mark Boucher. The pair has been in the eye of the storm generated by the Social Justice and Nation-Building (SJN) report, but Smith was cleared last week and charges against Boucher were dropped less than a week before his disciplinary hearing was to begin. The word “finality” is doing the rounds. Except that the SJN hearings were never about individuals or drawing a line in the sand. And Cricket South Africa (CSA) now has the opportunity to move the discussion away from two, influential figures and onto the game as a whole.It’s easy to see why Smith and Boucher became the epicentre. As director of cricket and national men’s coach, the pair held the two most powerful positions in South African cricket and the manner in which they came to occupy them – in a matter of a few frenzied days in December 2019 – sparked questions of favouritism and fears of a “white takeover”.Related

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But how they came to illustrate the totality of concerns raised by the SJN is another matter. Their names were mentioned on the very first day of testimony, when former board member Dr Eugenia Kula-Ameyaw, who conceptualised the SJN, questioned the process of their appointments. Though CSA has acknowledged the flaws which led to positions being filled without advertising or interviews, it also pointed out that those processes were ratified by the previous board and no further action can be taken.Subsequently, Smith and Boucher were named by several people who testified at the hearings. Occasionally, the ombudsman’s assistants asked witnesses whether Smith and Boucher, in particular, were involved in incidents of racial discrimination. But the pair’s prominence only become part of the dominant narrative with the filing of the SJN report, in which ombudsman Dumisa Ntsebeza said he felt they could have engaged in racially discriminatory behaviour. He encouraged CSA to investigate further.Though titled “Interim Report”, it is the only document CSA has received from the ombudsman and because it was unable to make definitive findings it left CSA in an impossible position. The board could not responsibly act on “tentative findings”, but it also could not ignore the report, having thrown its weight behind the process. The only solution was to follow the ombudsman’s advice and embark on a formal process against those named within; and the only processes the board could embark on was against people who worked with CSA. Which is how we come to Smith and Boucher.

The SJN was a flawed report because it was not definitive. It left the door open for only two figures to become the main characters and while their levels of seniority means they may always have been part of the story, they are not the entirety of it

We must remember that Smith and Boucher were not the only people named in the report. AB de Villiers, for example, was one of the most prominent persons to be named, along with a string of former and current players, some of whom supplied written affidavits to the SJN (such as de Villiers) and others who did not. Naming (and shaming, as it were) cannot be the point of an exercise like the SJN because it then loses any chance at real meaning, which involves addressing the macro-issues.The testimony shared at the SJN covered a period from pre-readmission (Omar Henry’s memories of being ostracised by both communities of colour and white is one example) to the present day. But the focus was largely on the national men’s team, from readmission to the mid-2010s. That is a period in which Boucher (in his affidavit) said players were unprepared because CSA did not do enough to equip them with how to deal with “the legacy of Apartheid… the additional pressures placed on them by the country and the media, how we ensure that there is equality, respect, empathy and inclusiveness in the team”.There’s some naivety in Boucher’s statement – which may extend to other players at the time – which suggests they did not assume responsibility for being part of a changing world, and perhaps did not see the need to change with that world. At a professional level, cricket remained a white-dominated sport, even as it began to operate at the intersection of old South Africa and new. In fact, it had more of a foot in the old, simply because more of the people involved were from that side of history and could establish their way of doing things as the norm.For a better understanding, we need to look a little deeper into the dominant sporting culture at the time, which came from the elite schoolboy system of hierarchy. To this day, the top schools in the country operate in this way, where there is bullying, unpleasant rites of initiation and unspoken rules of who can do what and when. Coming through it is a rite of passage for many young people, who are taught to be tough and have to learn that the hard way.The current crop of South Africa players have been through several culture camps•AFP/Getty ImagesThat’s why we get statements like “this is a man’s environment” and “harden up” from current Test captain Dean Elgar. It’s why it was acceptable for South African fans to taunt David Warner with his wife’s intimate history. This is a place where overt displays of masculinity are celebrated and any form of vulnerability is not, and it was even more stark in that immediate post-readmission period.As a young player, and especially a young player of colour, coming into that space was difficult. Challenging it was unthinkable. Neither Paul Adams, nor Boucher would have been able to say if they found the songs at fines meetings inappropriate. No one would have. Interestingly, no one else who played with Adams or Boucher has said anything about their experience. Adams has subsequently realised he was the target of a racial slur; Boucher has since said he understands the seriousness of the offence caused.So the actual question we should we ask is whether anything has changed?Boucher, in his statement on Tuesday, maintains that the team environment is “inclusive”, something which players including white-ball captain Temba Bavuma have confirmed. The current crop of players have been through several culture camps and have established three pillars which they consider the core of their approach: respect, empathy and belonging. In terms of buzz-speak that sounds good.They still hold fines meetings, they still sing songs, and they still use stereotypes in a half-jest, half-mocking way. Is that just part of the bonding exercise all teams go through? Or is it something that needs deeper consideration and more thought, especially in a society like South Africa’s? Those are the questions this current group of players needs to answer as it seeks to move forward, from the old days where Boucher and his ilk were unsure how to deal with each other, to a time when it can embody the idea of unity.The SJN has made us think and talk about this, beyond just cricket’s circles. It gave a voice to the likes of Adams, who said that he had never before had the opportunity to talk about his experience, while providing a platform for those accused to reply. Smith and Boucher chose not to do that in person, instead providing written submissions. That was their right, but it may have robbed the process of a necessary level of humanity, or the opportunity to allow people to understand each other better.At the same time, the SJN was a flawed report because it was not definitive. It left the door open for only two figures to become the main characters and while their levels of seniority means they may always have been part of the story, they are not the entirety of it. Only once we start to confront the offshoots – the issues around development, the women’s game, school structures, support staff concerns and everything in between – will see the full benefit of a process such as the SJN. That was the firestarter; now the flames must catch.

Visitors’ top four’s numbers so far in 2022 read 13 ducks with only six fifty-plus scores, and a collective average of 21.65

Mohammad Isam17-Jun-2022Shakib Al Hasan hasn’t looked this helpless for a long time. Shortly after Kyle Mayers delivered a double-wicket maiden to gut the Bangladesh middle order, there was nothing left for the new captain to do. He hadn’t faced a single ball while his team had crashed to 45 for 6 one hour into the match.If their 2018 visit to Antigua and their 2022 batting form is anything to go by, then the fate of the innings, the Test and the series was all but decided in the first hour.Within minutes of assessing the depth of Bangladesh’s collapse, Shakib proceeded to slog, hack and chance his arm for the remaining hour-and-a-half. It was definitely ugly. It was not first-day Test-match batting by any stretch of the imagination. But what could he do, really? Shakib’s 51 off 67 balls at least got Bangladesh to three-figures.Unless the bowlers put together a miraculous comeback on the second day, West Indies are already on top of this contest. Kemar Roach and Jayden Seales gave them a strong start, before Mayers and Alzarri Joseph rammed home the advantage with tight lines and subtle movement. Bangladesh were bowled out for 103.Mind you, Seales, Joseph, Mayers and Nkrumah Bonner, who took two catches at slip, had only just arrived in Antigua from Multan where they played an ODI series against Pakistan. Modern cricketers are used to jetlag, but they’re still human beings. And human beings can’t just rock up to a Test match after flying halfway across the world and not feel some aftereffects.Bangladesh had an opportunity to exploit that. Instead, they succumbed to their demons. Fresh off a home Test defeat in which their batters scored six ducks in the first innings, they proceeded to get exactly as many on the first day in Antigua too.Young opener Mahmudul Hasan Joy continued to blow hot and cold as he got out for without scoring for the fifth time in seven Tests. He has also made 78 in New Zealand and 137 in South Africa, but poking at everything outside off stump is fast becoming a (bad) habit. At No. 3, Najmul Hossain Shanto’s ‘talented’ tag is wearing thin. He is considered Bangladesh’s future, but just one half-century in his last 17 Test innings is testing this idea heavily.ESPNcricinfo LtdMominul Haque, in his first innings after resigning from Test captaincy, was again behind the eight ball. He is going through a bad patch, which every player does. But being rushed against fast bowling doesn’t look good for someone who, just a year ago, had seemed so at ease in Test cricket.The Bangladesh top four’s numbers in the first six months of 2022 don’t make good reading: 13 ducks with only six fifty-plus scores, and a collective average of 21.65. Much of it is due to the poor form of Mominul and Shanto.Tamim Iqbal, Mahmudul, Shanto and Mominul were all gone by the 14th over in Antigua. Without Mushfiqur Rahim and his understudy Yasir Ali, this was self-defeating to say the least. When Mayers removed the in-form Litton Das and Nurul Hasan in the same over, it wasn’t just two meaty blows to the visitors’ batting line-up. It was the end of the match as a contest.Litton didn’t show a semblance of patience, which was a surprise given his impressive form this year. Nurul, whose domestic form demanded a return to both the red- and white-ball teams, was lbw while leaving the ball.All this left Shakib having to swing at everything. He managed to get set despite trying to slog half the balls in an over, and trying to farm the strike in the other three. When he was set, he started to pick gaps by going over the fielders. Shakib didn’t even have the time or space to bat properly.Bangladesh’s tail-enders were never in with a chance. And it is a proper tail after Mehidy Hasan Miraz gets out, especially when they don’t pick Taijul Islam. Russell Domingo, Jamie Siddons and Khaled Mahmud have their work cut out managing not just the top order, but also in giving the tail some confidence.The BCB have ensured ample training camps for the South Africa, Sri Lanka and West Indies series, but no amount of training or motivation seem to be working for the Bangladesh batters. West Indies applied the same, simple formula that South Africa and Sri Lanka did in the preceding few months. They waited for the Bangladesh batters’ mistakes, and those came thick and fast.Perhaps it really was best that none of this was shown on TV back home.

“What we have not done well will take care of itself as long as we keep improving what we do really well”

Shashank Kishore26-Aug-2022″If I talk sense, they listen to me. If I talk bulls**t, they don’t. It’s as simple as that.”That was February 2017. Sridharan Sriram was being succinct, as usual. Just minutes earlier, Steve O’Keefe, the left-arm spinner, had spoken glowingly about Sriram’s influence and strategic inputs after his 12-wicket haul in Pune had consigned India to one of their heaviest Test defeats at home in recent times.With the Australia men’s team, where he worked with as spin consultant for seven years until two months ago, Sriram had time to build relationships with the players. As Bangladesh’s de facto T20 head coach, he will barely get three training sessions to try and lift a team stuck in a rut in the format.Related

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President in control, cricket in chaos – the Bangladesh story

Since 2021, Bangladesh have lost 23 of their 35 T20Is. This includes losses in all their Super 12 games at last year’s World Cup and series losses to Pakistan, Afghanistan, West Indies and Zimbabwe. It’s an unenviable position to be where Sriram is, but he has the methods, picked up while being a part of the entire coaching spectrum over the past decade.Bangladesh’s set-up is a complex one. For all the powers or freedom a head coach may have, there’s always the board president’s shadow looming. That is enough pressure to contend with. We aren’t even factoring in the weight of expectation from the fanatical supporters.Sriram, though, isn’t fussed. He loves challenges and embraces them. He has had to put in the hard yards to evolve. Sriram’s first-class record will tell you he made nearly 10,000 first-class runs. But, as coach, it’s his expertise in spin bowling that has made him famous.”I’ve just forgotten the fact that I was a player, it doesn’t matter how many runs I’ve scored,” he said in his first media interaction since being appointed by the BCB. “I’m here to help other people. Probably one of my biggest strengths is I don’t carry baggage of my playing days, or frustrations, or my past into coaching.Sridharan Sriram worked with Royal Challengers Bangalore in IPL 2022•Royal Challengers Bangalore”[As coach] you see others with a completely different set of eyes, and my experience dealing with different cultures at the IPL [with Kings XI Punjab – now Punjab Kings – and Royal Challengers Bangalore], with the Indian boys, the Aussie set-up will help. There is a good mix of the east and the west [in my education]. Coming into a culture like Bangladesh, I understand their upbringing, the way they approach the game.”At the same time, I can bring in that professionalism. I can really set clear expectations on what is required at this level from a professional standpoint, so it’s a good culmination of all these [factors] and I’m really looking forward to it.”Mike Hesson, director of cricket at Royal Challengers, has had a ringside view of Sriram’s methods. The two first together for a season at Kings XI Punjab [as it was known then] and then later came together at Royal Challengers where they continue to push the bar. Together, they’ve lifted an underperfoming unit to a consistent one; they’ve now made the playoffs for three seasons in a row.”Even though Sri is experienced, he’s always looking to get ahead, challenge the norms and that’s important in a coaching group, where you want to break boundaries and look for new methods techniques to get that advantage,” Hesson told ESPNcricinfo. “He’s always looking at trends of the modern game. He always comes back refreshed with ideas to add to the group.”One of Sriram’s strengths is building relationships with players he works with. His speciality is spin but he has got enough batting expertise that makes his inputs in that area invaluable too.

“Bangladesh’s average is one of the best in the world [when it comes to picking up] the first three wickets. It’s not about what they have not done well, it’s about reiterating what they are doing well and getting the best out of them”Sridharan Sriram

Marnus Labuschagne’s rapport with Sriram is a good example. When on his first tour to India, with the Australia A team in 2018, an eager Labuschagne got help from Sriram to six a specific weakness against spin. Sriram helped prepare the appropriate surfaces, devised plans to help him employ the sweep and, at times, even facilitated extra sessions, beyond the stipulated time, to get Labuschagne ready.In Nathan Lyon, Sriram found a fiercely competitive bowler who bought into his ideas whole-heartedly, while also challenging him and identifying areas he could get better at. Sriram convinced Glenn Maxwell that he was not making the most of his bowling ability, apart from helping him adopt a few tweaks to make him a more complete batter against spin.The other aspect Sriram has worked hard at is in trying to keep up with the evolving trends. Data and analytics are an integral part of his coaching methodology.”From a technical point of view, data has a huge role to play. [But] data without context is like money without food. Sri has taken it to another level where he is able to correlate data with visual evidence,” Malolan Rangarajan, talent scout at Royal Challengers, told us. “He’s always with his iPad or laptop, looking at videos and planning for the next game, the next scenario.”Like in the first game in this year’s IPL, the plotting of Mayank Agarwal’s wicket to Wanindu Hasaranga: I know Sri watched a number of videos, but there wasn’t too much data to dictate the kind of fields we set. It was based more on the bowler’s strengths, and we came up with an unorthodox field to get him [after the powerplay]. And we had him an over later. I’m not saying Sri is the only guy who does it, but to see such plans come to life in person is amazing. As a coach, when you come up with plans that work, it’s distinctive.”Sridharan Sriram scored 9539 first-class runs, but it’s his knowledge of spin that has made him famous•ESPNcricinfo LtdFor Sriram, each challenge is defined by the end goal. And the process to achieve that begins with solid groundwork. This includes having chats with players to understand what has brought them where they are, what works for them and what doesn’t, their habits and routines prior to matches, and in general developing an understanding of where their game is and where they want to elevate it to.”I’m coming in with a fresh set of eyes. I carry no baggage,” Sriram said. “I’m bringing in my ideas and fresh energy, wanting to get the team together and start afresh.”I was looking at this stat: Bangladesh’s average is one of the best in the world [when it comes to picking up] the first three wickets. It’s not about what they have not done well, it’s about reiterating what they are doing well and getting the best out of them.”My focus is to be on their strengths and build on what they do really well. What we’ve not done well will take care of itself as long as we keep improving what we do really well.”Sriram’s, in many ways, is a modern-day approach that could deliver the desired results for a team struggling to create its identity. The question is if Bangladesh, so keen to chop and change when things don’t go well, are willing to give him time.