Follow UsIn the IPL 2023, Kolkata Knight Riders roped in Chandrakant Pandit as the head coach after Brendon McCullum joined the England Test team. It was a left-field choice, particularly because Pandit didn’t have any franchise coaching experience but came up with a decorated CV of coaching Mumbai, Vidarbha, and Madhya Pradesh - helping them to titles.
While his strict approach was a massive success in the Indian domestic circuit, that didn’t seem to work really well in IPL - as KKR finished in the seventh position with just six wins from 14 games. Namibia all-rounder David Wiese, who was a part of last year’s KKR side, stated that the atmosphere in the dressing room was not so quite great, with no alignment of objective.
“There were certain issues going on behind the scenes in the team. Guys weren’t happy with certain things that were going on, and a lot of the time, it was a tough changing room. There was a new coach coming in, and he liked to do things a certain way, but that didn’t sit well with the players,” David Wiese said on the Hitman for Hire podcast.
“Guys were frustrated because a lot changed, and the coach brought in things he thought would bring success. But as an overseas player, they sometimes don’t sit well. He’s known in India as a fairly militant coach and strict disciplinarian. The overseas guys who’ve played all over the world don’t need someone coming in and telling them how to behave and what to wear and what to do. I was chill with it, but there were players more stubborn than me,” he added.
Kolkata Knight Riders then brought Gautam Gambhir as mentor for the IPL 2024, with Pandit still taking care of the side as head coach.