S. Ramakrishnan or CKM Dhananjai set to travel South Africa with the Indian Test squad

The support staff of the Indian team was changed ahead of the tour of South Africa as CKM Dhananjai was appointed as team analyst. He replaced Ashish Tulli following the request of the team management in order to travel with the ‘best support staff and technology support possible’. The step seems to be a logical one as the year 2018 is touted to be one of the toughest for Team India as they will tour South Africa, England Australia. However, it is still unclear if Dhananjai will be able to travel with the team and S. Ramakrishnan is the likeliest candidate to replace him in either case.

Dhananjai was at the helm during all of India’s successful campaigns in the ICC tournaments in 2007, 2011 and 2013. He was also part of the staff when the Test team of India reached the number 1 position in 2009 for the first time ever. He is currently the analyst of Mumbai Indians franchise in Indian Premier League (IPL) and will have to resign from that position according to BCCI’s regulations to avoid conflict of interest.

Ramakrishnan most likely to travel

SportsMechanics has been providing the technical support to the team for a long time now and either of S. Ramakrishnan or CKM Dhananjai will travel with the squad. Though given the possibility of the conflict of interest issue with the latter, the former is the likeliest candidate to replace him. He is the founder of the SportsMechanics apart from being its CEO. Moreover, he was the first video analyst to travel with the team way back in 2003 and was also the part of several memorable victories.

“SportsMechanics has a huge amount of data, has a history of so many different matches across formats in various countries. It will be very helpful to the Indian team when it faces challenging series in South Africa, England and Australia over the next two seasons,” a source was quoted as saying by Sportstar. Dhananjai too has been popular with the Indian team courtesy his perfect during the crucial tournaments and it remains to be seen if he joins the team in the near future or not.