Interesting

With both Gregory King and John Gloster putting in their papers, the entire Indian support staff will undergo a revamp once new coach Gary Kirsten takes over. According to sources, like his predecessor Greg Chappell, the South African is also looking to set up his his own array of support staff to help him in his task, putting a big question mark over the future of other incumbents.

The resignation of Gloster and King has eased tensions of the board to a great extent, but its major headaches will be with its present assistant coach. Lalchand Rajput is believed to be under severe pressure to extend his contract despite his successful tenure with the Indian team since Twenty20 World Cup. According to sources, Kirsten isn’t in favour of Rajput in his new team and is believed to have formed his opinion after spending a few days with the team during the last two Test matches. Kirsten, however, has indicated that he’s fine with Venkatesh Prasad and Robin Singh.

Though the board has handed out a one-year contract to Venkatesh Prasad and Robin Singh till the end of April this year, it remains to be seen how the board will proceed thereafter. Prasad has hit the headlines for helping a young Indian bowling side to some spectacular victories in the last eight months, while Robin Singh has been a quiet achiever in his domain . It’s believed that while finalising of his contract, Kirsten had only spoken about brining in a mind doctor to help the team.

There indications to Surrey’s Neeraj Patel, who worked with the Indian team during the England Test series, is tipped to take over as the next Indian team physio while South Africa’s Shyamal Vallabjee is among the favourites to join as the team trainer. Vallabjee, who has worked with Mahesh Bhupathi in Bangalore was also here when Kirsten came over and since then there has been speculations about him joing Kirsten’s team after BCCI didn’t renew contracts of King and Gloster that expired last December.