Perhaps Time For A T20 Consultant?

[jeesh]

Lot of things have improved under our current coaching team. But as far as T20 goes, we are pretty much no better than how we were a few years ago.

After the Zimbabwe series when they scheduled an intense skills training, i was optimistic things would change. But apparently not. And when you leave and block deliveries in T20 like you are playing ODI's, you know things are far from ok.

Bowling wise we are still ok, although it can get better. Fielding has ups and downs. Batting is absolutely woeful. In fact they dont even have a clue how to play. Forget the six hitting, they cant even pick the one's and two's that are so crucial.

Many international teams have recruited specialized coaches (As consultants) for T20 prior to major T20 competitions.

Maybe BCB should consider bringing in someone like Brad Hodge or Hussey or Azhar Mahmood or Mahela Jayawardene to work under Hathurusinghe to specifically work on T20. Someone who has been in the thick of things in T20 whether as a player or coach or sth. There is a lot that we need to learn about T20, which we are simply not doing.

Any thoughts?

[tanvir_nus]

We need a captain that understands and wants to do well in T20s.
We need to play and host more BPLs. So it's a matter of time as well.
We need batsmen who are capable of clearning the fence, who prefer to muscle the ball, bring me batsmen who have clear strike powers.
We need to stop creating excuses for being the worst of the kind to play this format, we have played this game from its birth and 5 of our players have played 6 consecutive world cups, we need to start performing, NOW.

No matter who you bring as a coach, if you don't have the T20 strike powers, you are just not going to get past the rope, literally as well as figuratively. We need to fix our batting in T20, and mind you when T20 batting looks good, batting as a whole of the team changes and becomes better, India is ranked number in T20s but their batsmen are that of the best category can be easily taken as an overall example.

I have trust in the current coaching staff, it's just that we need to find those players and find them fast as well as create more emphasis on power hitting

[Rinathq]

Excellent point. We need a part time consultant that played a lot of T20s. Hodge, Azhar, Hussey are excellent names. I would also like to refer some more names like Styris, Collingwood, Sanga, Botha and so on.

Need someone that will teach them to pace their innings through continuous singles and doubles while capitalizing on the early power play overs and later taking advantage of the 4th, 5th and 6th bowlers.

[jeesh]

@tanvir_nus. We also used to think we will need a pace bowling academy, pace hunts etc to find good fast bowlers. Enter Heath Streak and all of a sudden who needs a pace academy.

I have no less faith in our coaching team than you do. I would definitely want BCB extend all their contracts to 2019.

But if we want to improve in T20 in the short term, we need someone to come in teach these guys some tricks or two. Mahela for ex would be an excellent mentor. Even at this age he is scoring runs in Big Bash. I dont think we ll be able to find the broad shouldered big hitters overnight. Until then someone needs to teach the likes of Soumya, Shabbir etc how to keep runs ticking.

Btw one reason Pakistan secured Azhar Mahmood as bowling coach (Why would do they need a bowling coach when they have Waqar?) is his knowledge in T20, which would be invaluable in Asia Cup and T20 WC.