Former national team coach Gary Kirsten felt that Indian Premier league has played a major role in the rise of promising young cricketers in the country.
"What I think is the prominent rise of young Indian cricketers is because of IPl. The players get to play with the best around the world and that experience adds too much. It's a great learning experience which helps them to learn and improve the standard of their game. And that is what they reflect when they get to perform in the senior level," said Kirsten.
In the past couple of years, many young cricketers like Washington Sundar, Rishabh Pant, Shreyas Iyer have come up after performing well at IPl and have carried on that form into the senior level. While Gary mentored Pant and Iyer during his span with Delhi daredevils, currently he's working with Sundar in Royal Challengers Bangalore squad.
The former South African batsman, who was in charge of the Indian side from 2008-2011, has heaped praise on the Indian players' performances at world stage. "India have always been fantastic when it comes to cricket. They have such great players since always who have achieved so much in the game.
They perform brilliantly and as a spectator I like to watch them," he explained.
Speaking about reuniting with the country in terms of coaching a big pool of aspirants, Kirsten said, "It's a real privilege to be involved in coaching in India. There are so many talented young players as well as many more who love playing the game for fun. I'm excited to offer a coaching service to those who not only play for enjoyment but also have aspirations to play at a higher/ professional level."
Gary, who is the batting mentor of RCB, is currently setting up his own cricket academy in India to nurture budding talent in the country. He said that idea of setting up the academy in India is to channel the vast passion for cricket in the country which he had himself monitored during his coaching tenure.
"Over the last 4 years, the Gary Kristen Cricket (GKC) team has had the privilege of running coaching camps all around the world. And India is one of the destinations that my team has explored and the idea is to give access and quality information to as many young cricketers out there as possible," he said.
The main focus is to share what they have learned from the game to the young players. "We love sharing what we have learned and we continue to learn things in all areas we coach. We are looking forward to tapping into the vast passion of Indian cricket and will strive to continue to share as much as we can," he explained.
He added that they will be working for the betterment of each aspect of the sport and not only for the primary areas like batting and bowling.
"We aimed at improving all-around skills whether it's ball skills, strength, agility, technique, and confidence in young players. With cricket being one of the most popular and successful sports in India, this is a great way to introduce children to this wonderful game."
The scouting camp began in Mumbai on 24th April and their goal is to pick raw talents from across the country.
"We are keen to provide a platform for all players to explore their games and our talent-hunt structure and the program allows us to look at all areas of the game. We are able to see batting on the front and back foot, bowling speed, accuracy and skill, catching techniques, fielding techniques and movement ability," he explained.
With his previous experience of monitoring cricket in India, Gary spoke about the passion for the sport in the country, especially among youngsters to make a career out of it.
"There is an incredible amount of passion for cricket in India and almost all players have a dream of representing India internationally. The passion allows for freedom to come up with amazing ways to play the game. Different techniques, styles, attitudes make it exciting and help strengthen the game further," he added.
Gary's academy is also offering chances for women cricketers to come up and showcase their budding talent in the sport. And the former Indian coach seems to be quite impressed with the response he has got so far.
"It's incredible to see the amount of female participation in Indian cricket and I look forward to seeing them show off their skills across the country. It is fantastic to see how the game is growing around the world and we look forward to working with many girls in our cricket programmes," he said.