Too much U-19 cricket dangerous, says Dravid

03:59PM Wed 25 Oct, 2017

Last week when the junior national selectors did not pick Prithvi Shaw in the India Under-19 team for the upcoming Asia Cup, asking him to play in the Ranji Trophy instead, it created ripples in the cricket fraternity. It was a first-of-a-kind move.The 17-year-obld Mumbai opener vindicated their stand with a fluent 123 against Tamil Nadu on Tuesday morning. It took a man nearing 300 Test wickets, R Ashwin, to dislodge him. Shaw is a perfect example of how Rahul Dravid, the custodian of Indian cricket supply line, is going about his business in taking players to the next level. Dravid, the coach of the India U-19 and 'A' teams, wants a fine balance between age-group cricket and exposure to the first-class stage. "At the moment, we definitely want him (Prithvi) to be part of the U-19 World Cup team in January. It's also important to represent your country at the junior level," Dravid stated on Tuesday. There have been many cases in Indian cricket where prolific performers in age-group cricket have disappeared from the scene once they were done with U-19 cricket. For Dravid, U-19 can't be a habit for a player. "One of the things I realised when I took over the U-19 team was people stay on and play too much of Under-19, which is dangerous," the former India captain said. That's why players were barred last year from playing in two U-19 World Cups anymore. The trend set by Dravid now is followed by the local associations too. "Guys like Washington Sundar, Zeeshan Ansari, Mahipal Lomror and Armaan Jaffer have all been picked in their first-class sides. That is a positive for me. Even the state associations are looking ahead. They are not forcing them to play U-19 cricket." He added: "Age group cricket has a purpose to solve but it's limited. Then on they have to go and play men's cricket. That's what we decided with Prithvi as well." Source: Cricbuzz

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Too much U-19 cricket dangerous, says Dravid

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