Along with the players, the IPL also offers great opportunties to coaches and other coaching staff to make a name for themselves, apart from baggin the lucractive contracts with the franchises.
Some of the names who have been successful as cricketers are bound to get coaching roles.
Here are 4 legendary cricketers who are head coach in the IPL 2023:
Ricky Ponting – Delhi Capitals
Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting was named the head coach of the Delhi Capitals in 2018. Delhi attained progressive success in the Indian Premier League under Ponting as their head coach. In 2019, they finished 3rd and reached the playoffs for the first time since 2019; then in 2020, Delhi reached their first-ever final but lost to Mumbai. They were the table-toppers in 2021, but failed to reach the final; DC finished 5th in 2022.
Previously, Ponting had coached Mumbai Indians to the 2015 title.
A serial trophy-winning captain with Australia, Ponting would like to win an Indian League trophy as Delhi’s head coach.
Brian Lara – Sunrisers Hyderabad
The legendary West Indian batsman, Brian Lara replaced Tom Moody as the head coach of Sunrisers Hyderabad ahead of the IPL 2023 auction.
Lara was part of the SRH team management in Indian Premier League 2022 as a strategic advisor and batting coach. The Premier League 2023 is his first assignment as a head coach of a T20 team in a major franchise league.
Ashish Nehra – Gujarat Titans
The Gujarat Titans were trolled, mocked and questioned when they appointed the pair of Ashish Nehra as head coach and Hardik Pandya as captain ahead of their debut IPL season in 2022.
For, Nehra’s stint as bowling coach of RCB wasn’t great and didn’t result into any final appearance for RCB, while Pandya had never had captaincy experience at a high level.
However, Nehra and Pandya proved every critic wrong and shut down all doubters by topping the points table in the league stage and won the 2022 trophy. Gujarat has now emerged as the best chasing side in the Indian Premier League currently. The pair was lauded by all players for the environment they kept in the dressing room, the confidence they boosted in each player and the security of position in the side they gave them which liberated the player from any insecurity shackles.
Kumar Sangakkara – Rajasthan Royals
Kumar Sangakkara was picked up by Rajasthan Royals in 2021 in the dual role of the Head coach and director of cricket for “overseeing the entire cricketing ecosystem of the Royals franchise, including coaching structure, auction plans and team strategy, talent discovery and development, as well as the development of the Royals Academy in Nagpur.”
Sangakkara took over the head coach duties from Andrew McDonald.
While under Sangakkara, the first season for the Royals was disappointing, with theirs finishing 7th in 8 teams in 2021, the bounced back in 2022 to finish second out of 10 teams in the points table and reach the final, which they lost to Gujarat.
