Pick your poison: Shastri or Kohli?

[maniac]

Who is better or worse ?

 

I know usually it’s the combo of Kohli- Shastri that gets attacked however Shastri was the coach during the Aus series as well and I know at the end of the day winner writes the history but all players were giving credit to the coaching staff after pulling that heist.

 

On the flip side, Kohli even though might be average as captain but still is our best batsman and in all fairness a great batsman.

 

If you had a choice between the 2 who would you pick?

[R!TTER]

Pick your poison  - Neither a certified choker nor a certified 

[maniac]

1 minute ago, R!TTER said:

Pick your poison  - Neither a certified choker nor a certified 

Thats the best use of a smiley I have seen in a while 

[Lord]

Shastri

 

Kohli can play as a batsmen with no role in team strategies

[ShoonyaSifar]

Shastri. A coach can damage only to an extent. With a decent captain, the extent of damage can be managed 

 

But a egomaniac insecure dictator can/will destroy not just the current team but leave behind a legacy that may take years to be corrected

[Vilander]

Kohli as batsman and Shastri as team manager or chief executive coaching can report into him and he manages media relations. 

[Vickydev]

Shastri is there to just collect his paychecks. I really doubt him staying or leaving will make any difference

[New guy]

Shastri. We saw in the aus series that youngsters were motivated and management was willing to support team and be aggressive despite Shastri. Clearly Clearly jinx and spanner in the works is kohli and not shastri 

[Suhaan]

Throw both of them out,Shastri was only boozing day in and out in Australia,just to avoid embarrassment everyone in the squad were making up stories of him giving bevda talk to team members

 

Edited June 27, 2021 by Suhaan

[kirkutfan]

We caricature both of them. Shastri is smarter than the “drunk uncle” we make him out to be. And Kohli is more substantive than the loudmouth dictator he is made out to be. Yet, neither are perfect. But I am not convinced that there are obvious better replacements either. For example I am not convinced that we would have had more wins, if let say you had a Kumble- Rahane combo. That would have had its own set of pluses and minuses. So, for now I am fine with both Kohli and Shastri. After the t20 World Cup, one can reevaluate. Not just who is in charge, but how we go about it. For example, would it make sense to have separate teams and support staffs for t20s and tests? Is the separate team thing that we have going now with teams in SL and England, a way for the future? Or is that just a one time COVID adjustment.

[maniac]

1 hour ago, New guy said:

Shastri. We saw in the aus series that youngsters were motivated and management was willing to support team and be aggressive despite Shastri. Clearly Clearly jinx and spanner in the works is kohli and not shastri 

I am of the same opinion but to be devils advocate, don’t see Shastri going above or beyond the status quo in Australia either. He had to play what he was left with.

 

Apart from Kuldeep Yadav who seemed like the obvious choice in the final test for the spinner slot every player that played was only due to the lack of options. Sundar over Kuldeep turned out to be a master stroke. Even that choice seemed the safe bet at that time given Sundar’s known batting ability. It just so worked out that Sundar contributed with the ball as well.

 

Had a full strength team been available even minus Kohli don’t think there would be too many out of the box changes.

 

 

[BacktoCricaddict]

43 minutes ago, kirkutfan said:

We caricature both of them. Shastri is smarter than the “drunk uncle” we make him out to be. And Kohli is more substantive than the loudmouth dictator he is made out to be. Yet, neither are perfect. But I am not convinced that there are obvious better replacements either. For example I am not convinced that we would have had more wins, if let say you had a Kumble- Rahane combo. That would have had its own set of pluses and minuses. So, for now I am fine with both Kohli and Shastri. After the t20 World Cup, one can reevaluate. Not just who is in charge, but how we go about it. For example, would it make sense to have separate teams and support staffs for t20s and tests? Is the separate team thing that we have going now with teams in SL and England, a way for the future? Or is that just a one time COVID adjustment.

Good post.  Agree about Shastri, but not Kohli.  It is hard to ignore Aus minus Kohli and the WTC 21 disaster upon his return.  Something's amiss there.

[kirkutfan]

2 hours ago, BacktoCricaddict said:

Good post.  Agree about Shastri, but not Kohli.  It is hard to ignore Aus minus Kohli and the WTC 21 disaster upon his return.  Something's amiss there.

In this game, the issue was probably more with Kohli the batsman. He was the only one of the top order batsmen who had a reasonable chance of scoring big on this track. Rohit, Pujara, Rahane- not so much. Problem is that Kohli, of late, hasn’t been in great form either. With scores like 217 and 170- the bowlers didn’t have much of a chance.  We can argue on whether Siraj should have played instead of Jadeja, or whether Jadeja should have bowled more in tandem with Ashwin. The reality is that with those scores, the probability was that we were going to lose. The Australian win was great, but that again was in part because we were fortunate to get some nice scoring by later order players like Thakur, Sundar, Pant. The top order, for the most part, wasn’t great there either. However, guys like that will not cover for that top order weakness all the time. Hopefully, some of these top order guys gain form this England series. Maybe Shubman Gill figures it out. Otherwise, we are in for a rebuild that could take a while.

[Ankit_sharma03]

Kohli is the problem not shastri

[Lone Wolf]

Shastri easily..  Actually we don't need Kohli the captain nor the batsman in any format.  This is not 90's that we have only one batsman.  Kohli is below average in every field these days 

[Real McCoy]

16 hours ago, maniac said:

Who is better or worse ?

 

I know usually it’s the combo of Kohli- Shastri that gets attacked however Shastri was the coach during the Aus series as well and I know at the end of the day winner writes the history but all players were giving credit to the coaching staff after pulling that heist.

 

On the flip side, Kohli even though might be average as captain but still is our best batsman and in all fairness a great batsman.

 

If you had a choice between the 2 who would you pick?

That's the conundrum isn't it. If kohli stays as captain, I would go for Shastri as he as a coach can do the least damage to the team. Shastri is basically a yes man. If Kohli wasn't a captain, he will be a yes man to the next one. Also Shastri is a good media man even if he gets down the team bus with a beer bottle open and drinking in front of the cameras for show. He can be a good mental conditioning coach for youngsters who are down on luck. His pep talk may sound stupid to us but is a good confidence booster for youngsters.

If Kohli steps down as captain and plays as a batsman alone and working well with the next captain, then Kohli is the choice. A batter of his caliber is more useful to a team than any coach.

[New guy]

16 hours ago, maniac said:

I am of the same opinion but to be devils advocate, don’t see Shastri going above or beyond the status quo in Australia either. He had to play what he was left with.

 

Apart from Kuldeep Yadav who seemed like the obvious choice in the final test for the spinner slot every player that played was only due to the lack of options. Sundar over Kuldeep turned out to be a master stroke. Even that choice seemed the safe bet at that time given Sundar’s known batting ability. It just so worked out that Sundar contributed with the ball as well.

 

Had a full strength team been available even minus Kohli don’t think there would be too many out of the box changes.

 

 

Yes, in this case I am not talking about the selection themselves. I am talking about the freedom and clear mind which players played with, including young players, which is not seen when kohli is present 

[coffee_rules]

Kohli, if a real coach is selected over a cheerleader cum motivational speaker, India will do better. 

[vayuu1]

One is kaalkoot other is halahal pick ur poison

[raki05]

7 minutes ago, vayuu1 said:

One is kaalkoot other is halahal pick ur poison

I thought kala kutta and ha**mi.