'I would love to coach an IPL franchise' - Irfan Pathan after completing NCA coaching course [Exclusive]

Irfan Pathan, during his playing days, was known for his all-round skills. He started out first as an out and out swing bowler and troubled the best of batsmen. As time passed, his batting improved significantly as well and turned out to be a brilliant all-rounder for India. In terms of all-rounder, he is certainly the one as he is foraying into coaching as well now having completed the Level 2 coaching course at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru.

Even his brother Yusuf Pathan took up the course even as the NCA head Rahul Dravid had a keen eye on the proceedings. Coaching is not something new for Irfan as he has done that before at the domestic level. He played for Jammu & Kashmir team as a coach-cum-player and did a great job with the team also identifying a few players as potential stars in the near future.

Having completed the coaching course recently, Irfan Pathan opened up about his experience and also revealed if he is willing to take up a coaching role going forward in an exclusive chat with CricTracker.

Here are the excerpts:

Q. It was a four-day online and four day onsite programme. In this 8-day course, what were your prime learnings?

When you have experience of playing around 175 international matches, which I have, when you go for this course, you actually obviously go to learn the details of everything and I think NCA is doing a fantastic job on that regard. Why I wanted to take up this course was, anyway I am into coaching for last three years but I wanted to get the structure in my coaching.

Special Thanks to the NCA faculty @APURVASDESAII @rajibdatta1971 @SujithSomsu #Ananddate #harsha #ashishkaushik #amittyagi #shemalvengankar @kshemalw you guys are helping Indian cricket grow in many ways.

— Irfan Pathan (@IrfanPathan) August 13, 2021

I think this course will really help me going forward. The whole faculty – Apurva Desai, Rajib Datta, Sujith Somasundar, Amit Asawa and then being headed by Rahul Dravid, its an outstanding faculty. In terms of physios like Ashish Kaushik, Anand Date and everyone, they are doing a fantastic job of teaching the coaches to actually of getting the awareness as well which is important.

When you take up such courses, you revisit some of the things you know but at the same time you learn new things in terms of bio-mechanics as well and I had a great time. Those 8 days spending time with them, sharing my experience, learning from them. It was worth every bit of it. It was about coaching, how to handle and manage good players, difficult players, how to get the team in a better structure. So yeah, it was a really good experience.

Q. NCA is in safe hands of Rahul Dravid currently. What was his message after the completion of the course?

The best thing that has happened to Indian cricket is Rahul getting associated with NCA. I have a huge amount of respect for him. Rahul bhai has performed his role with utmost sincerity. Look, we know how Rahul Dravid got involved in U19 and India A. But how he gets involved in each and every coach as well in terms of sharing his knowledge, listening from their perspective as well which for a guy of his calibre is a big task.

But he does it with such ease. That’s why you have huge amount of respect. It doesn’t mater if you have played 1 or 100 first-class games, he gives you same amount of respect. His message was very clear to me and had a lot of positive things to say about me because he noticed me as I personally share a great rapport with him. What he said to me remains between us but you should ask him.

Q. With the successful completion of the coaching programme, are you eyeing to become a full-time coach?

Obviously, this is the ongoing process with the completion of those 8 days. But you still need to make sure you keep helping players and I do it anyways. So I will keep doing that. Obviously I am a broadcaster but I love helping out any guy who needs my help in terms of batting-bowling because you know I like to do both.

I understand basic nitty-gritty of technical side of batting, the stance, the head position, the bat flow and other things. I understand basic structure of bowling biomechanics as well. So I like to help out people. Hopefully in future when something comes up, I will definitely take up and would love to help out Indian cricket directly or indirectly.

Q. What made you take up this hybrid course?

Because this is a fantastic course and its always good to get a structure in your coaching. Knowledge is something which you should always looks to acquire. Even in those 8 days, if he/she learns only 2-3 important aspects of coaching, then the course is worth every bit of it. I always wanted to do it and you will always want to learn something new. Learning never stops and you need to be up to date to the new generation of coaching as well.

Q. Are you looking forward to taking up coaching of any IPL franchise in near future?

Yes, I would love to do that going forward and hopefully it will happen.