Language is NOT a barrier, says Stuart Law by Bipin Dani

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Player:

SG Law

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DateLine: 16th June 2016

 

Mumbai, June 16 : Unlike Mickey Arthur, who has expressed his desire to learn Urdu while coaching the Pakistan cricket team, Stuart Law may not have intentions of buying Hindi text books, but he believes the language will not be a barrier, if given opportunity to coach the Indian cricket team.

 

The 48-year-old Law is one among the few foreigners, who has responded to the BCCI advertisement.

 

Speaking exclusively over his mobile from Australia, he says, 'I am honoured to be named in the running to become the Head Coach to the Indian Cricket Team. As it is an extremely high profile position, the BCCI have expressed that the candidates be familiar with the Nations languages as well as having had extensive coaching experience either at a domestic or international level with some kind of success'.

 

'Communication skills befitting the coach of an International team are mandatory along with the ability to effectively convey the right messages and must demonstrate proficiency in English. The ability to communicate in an Indian language is desirable but by no means mandatory', one of the conditions the BCCI had ratified after initially making it mandatory.

 

'This is their wish and still to be shortlisted will be extremely humbling'.

 

'I don’t know the Nations languages but having spent a lot of time on the sub-continent, you learn how to pick up the mood of the conversation and determine the feelings of the group or individual by observation', Law said.

 

Law has worked with the national teams in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

 

'The majority of words used to talk about cricket are English, so it can be a little easier to communicate to players that aren’t comfortable speaking English'.

 

'It can also be an advantage to have one of the local support staff there to help get a message across in the language known to the player concerned', he signed off.

 

The top and also the middle order right-handed batsman (and right-arm medium pacer and googly bowler) has played only one Test but 54 ODIs for Australia.

 

(Article: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author only.
Copyright © 2016 Bipin Dani)