Gary Kirsten: Will discuss changes for next season with RCB owners

Gary Kirsten

The task ahead of Sunrisers Hyderabad is very simple - win their final game against Royal Challengers Bangalore at the Chinnaswamy Stadium here tonight and take their place in the playoffs as the fourth-placed team. If SRH win, the mathematical chances of the other teams are bleak and they can be safely ignored.

Wooden spoon for RCB?

RCB however, in all probability, will end up with the wooden spoon irrespective of tonight's result. They have been bad with the bat at times, poor with the ball on many more occasions but all that was made worse either by wrong team selection or non-optimal use of the personnel chosen.

No wonder then that Gary Kirsten, who pronounced himself as the Head Coach, this on the eve of RCB's last game, promised some 'structural changes' ahead of the next season. "There are some structural changes that need to be made [on issues] that have maybe been around for quite a long time. This is my first year as the Head Coach, so I've got a better understanding of what those are. We'll certainly discuss with our owners and look into that for next year," said Kirsten, who had insisted at the start of the season, with the blessings of the RCB management, that he was only part of the Coaching Leadership Team.

"I won't have a parking lot with my name on it," were Kirsten's exact words when he was officially welcomed into RCB ahead of this season. "Who says you must have a pyramid structure [meaning Head Coach and downwards]? In fact, if you look at modern management practices, most successful organisations are moving away from the pyramid structure," he had said.

Areas of concern

On Friday, he admitted his team has weak links but didn't identify any of the players. "All teams have got strengths and weaknesses. You've got to hide those weaknesses as best you can and make sure your strengths are working really well. And if they're not and you're losing games on the line, it makes a big difference.

We've struggled in certain areas that we thought we would be okay in, so for next year we're going to have to make sure we build some strength in those specific areas," said Kirsten.

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