There were some questions about India’s batting display in Sri Lanka, and it has now surfaced that head coach Gautam Gambhir’s staff was taken aback by it as well. Ryan ten Doeschate, the assistant coach, stated he didn’t believe he would have to focus on the Indian players’ ability to handle spin bowling. Against the hosts’ spinners, who have taken 27 Indian wickets in the series, they looked especially clueless. According to Captain Rohit Sharma, this was a problem that needed to be addressed.

Ten Doeschate said that this was a challenge that he wasn’t expecting but one he is looking forward to tackling. One of the challenges I wasn’t expecting and I kind of overlooked is the playing of spin by Indian batters. We got undone in Sri Lanka, Ten Doeschate told TalkSport Cricket.

The mindset of India has been such that they’ve been so desperate to do well overseas. The focus has moved to doing well in Australia, England so we’ve kind of let playing spin, which was always a strength of the Indian team, fall back a little bit. That’s one thing I’m looking forward to helping with, getting to that position where Indians are the best players of spin in the world again, the former Netherland all-rounder added.

I don’t think much of what we’re going to bring is technical knowledge to these guys. It’s more about mindsets, situational awareness, and how we think they can control certain phases of the game. It’s about throwing ideas out there, de-briefing, and keeping the mental space really good. That’s going to be really important, he concluded.