India A and U-19 coach Rahul Dravid will not be in charge of the U-23 squad that will participate in the Asian Cricket Council’s Emerging Trophy scheduled to be held in Bangladesh from March 25 to April 5, PTI reported.
Dravid is the coach for all junior national teams but BCCI are said to have decided to allow the former India captain to join his franchise Delhi Daredevils, who will start with their IPL camp in capital tentatively on March 28.
Technically, Dravid is well within his rights to join his IPL franchise as all Indian support staff’s contracts end on March 31 while the Emerging Trophy will end on April 5.
April and May are the two months when any support staff — be it coach, physio or trainer are free to offer their professional expertise to other sporting entities or to be precise IPL franchises.
According to well-placed sources in the BCCI, in all likelihood the National Cricket Academy coaches, WV Raman OR Narendra Hirwani will be in-charge of the team during the 10-day limited overs tournament.
The IPL starts on April 5 and BCCI has exempted all IPL players from the Emerging Cup.
“The Emerging team falls under NCA purview. Dravid is unlikely to go for this Dhaka meet. We have our NCA coaches and from among them we will select the coach for the India U-23 team,” a senior BCCI official was quoted as saying on condition of anonymity.
Only those domestic performers with no IPL contracts have been selected for the tourney. The likes of Prithvi Shaw, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Mayank Dagar are considered to be the Gen-Next of Indian cricket. Baba Aparajith will be leading the side despite a modest domestic season so far while brother Indrajith, who missed the bus despite 600 plus runs in the longer version.
