“Some players get injured because they have to play a lot of matches,” Saikia said. “If you look at their schedule, if you look at England, a team of 15 players went to ODIs and out of those 15, three or four players got injured.
“But before that they played in the IPL for two months. So all this affects the health of the players. And to avoid such situations, which is best we can do in the current windows and current FTP, we are trying to find some solutions.”
BCCI top brass met India head coach Gautam Gambhir, Center of Excellence (CoE) director of cricket VVS Laxman, T20I captain Shreyas Iyer and ODI captain Shubman Gill on Thursday in Mumbai.
Saikia said that in the next Future Tour Program (FTP), measures will be taken to ensure that players have enough time for rest and recovery.
“The only problem we have is that there are too many matches in a year and that’s why at the next FTP we will do certain things, we will take certain measures,” he said. “We have instructed our FTP representative, whom we will meet very soon at various international forums, that our FTP should be planned in such a way that the players have proper rest and also some kind of acclimatization or some friendly matches before any major series in SENA countries.
“The discussion today was about what protocols we need to follow in terms of maintaining the fitness level of each player, not the individual. And what is in the best interest of the team, that’s all we took into account. And we have received feedback from the captains and the head coach, who are the people who can provide us with information so that we chalk out the right strategy to avoid all such unwanted situations during any international or bilateral matches.”
‘We’ll have to do some soul-searching’ after England and Ireland defeats
India has a busy schedule for at least the next six months. After the T20I series against Afghanistan, which begins on September 13, they play the ODI and T20I series at home against the West Indies before heading to New Zealand for five T20Is and two Tests. They will next play white-ball series against Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe before hosting the Border-Gavaskar Trophy at home. Saikia said the purpose of Wednesday’s meeting was to create a roadmap for the next year leading up to the 2027 ODI World Cup and also look back at some of the recent performances.
“You all know that we lost matches in Ireland and also in England. We wanted to know what the reasons are and we need to do some introspection about it. And in the future, what we will do before we go to any of the SENA countries, we have outlined some strategies,” Saikia said.
“Our main goal is that we have the best team combination in October-November next year at the ODI World Cup.
Saikia also dismissed any rumors of miscommunication between the CoE, team management and selectors over player management, stressing that “everyone is on the same page.”
“There is no situation where there is a breakdown in communication or lack of integrity among the CE staff, Team India or technical staff. The only thing that worries us is the injuries of some players, which happen frequently, and to avoid this we have to do certain things. We must take some measures to ensure that players do not get injured frequently.”