Over the past few months, Pradosh Ranjan Paul has been receiving one message at every training session he has had with his coach Tanveer Jabbar: “Taming the monkey mind.”
And not without reason. Pradosh is known to be compact and solid at the crease, but was subject to a bad habit creeping into his batting over the last couple of seasons. Whenever the left-hander had done the hard work of settling in the middle, he used to throw his wicket away with a rash shot.
11 fifties scaling up to nine hundreds is a good conversion rate, particularly if one considers Pradosh’s average of 54.04. But those numbers don’t tell the complete story. If anything, he has remained a batsman who hasn’t fulfilled his potential, one whose career has wavered after the highs of a short India A stint which included 163 against South Africa A at Potchefstroom. Since then, he has tallied only 525 (8 matches), 484 (8 matches), 564 (7 matches) in three successive Ranji seasons with just four centuries.
On Monday, as Tamil Nadu began Day 2 against Uttarakhand in the second round of Ranji Trophy, he was the set batsman overnight, batting on 37. Their coach Yo Mahesh has been calling on his team to show their ruthless side and none exhibited it better than Pradosh.
He is a free-flowing batsman, one with a strong off-side game, particularly the drives and cuts being his strongest suits. Those have often tended to be the shots that have caused his downfall too, particularly when he goes chasing at those. During the off-season, Jabbar – who has been the batting coach of TN over the last couple of seasons, put in the effort to change it.
The drills were simple: “You have to be disciplined if you have to score big. You can leave 10 deliveries which are of drivable length. But if you play the 11th and end up losing your wicket, then there is no discipline. With Pradosh, batting time has never been a problem. If you look at his knocks, he spends a lot of time in the middle, can easily face 150-170 deliveries and from there on, when you are supposed to take command, if you end up playing a loose shot, then it is of no use. So the practice was all about extending that discipline,” Jabbar explained.
Through the course of his 279-ball stay when he scored 136 runs which included a 171-run partnership with Baba Indrajith (77), Pradosh showcased that newfound discipline. The Uttarakhand attack, in particular the two left-arm spinners, used the rough patch to invite him into drives. Even their pacers slanted across, with a vacant cover region, in the hope that the left-hander would play an expansive shot. But, Pradosh seldom took the bait. It is not as if he completely removed the drives and cuts from his playbook. But not once did he go searching for it. It meant, his innings was another grinding effort, with the half-century coming off 104 deliveries and his 9th century taking 211 deliveries.
“It was an important knock for me because, in my last 3 first class games coming into this game, I was getting out in the 80s. It wasn’t the bowlers who were getting me out. It was that one rash shot which got me. That was obviously there in my mind that if I get set this game, I’ll try to make it big. I was very sure in my head that I’m not going to gift my wicket today,” Pradosh said.
For a batsman who is technically sound, most of his work has been on the mental side. Apart from training with Jabbar, Pradosh revealed he has been working with former TN batsman Baba Aparajith as well. With the team undergoing transition, at 25 he is counted among the old hands. Despite his indifferent form last season, he was asked to bat at No 3, reinforcing the team management’s faith in his batting.
“It all sums up to mental discipline. Especially when your team needs a certain role to be carried out by you. So, that is when you put your team ahead. I knew I should value my wicket. Deep down I know that I have the shots. But, in this format, time is your friend. So, that is something I have learnt in the last couple of years. Eventually, the runs are going to flow and it’s going to come,” he said.
Once Indrajith’s stay ended with a delivery that kept low to trap him in front, TN’s slide began as well. From 235/3, they collapsed to 313 with left-arm spinner Mayank Mishra picking up a 5-wicket haul. With a 170-run cushion in hand, TN are pushing for an innings win.
Brief scores: Uttarakhand 134 & 9/1 vs TN 313 (Pradosh Ranjan Paul 136, Baba Indrajith 77; Mayank Mishra 5/118, Avneesh Sudha 4/34).