India’s head coach Rahul Dravid has a fair bit of experience of playing Test matches in South Africa and he would have shared a lot of that experience of dealing what he called “a great challenge and a great opportunity” with players for the three-match long series starting December 26 in Centurion.
Dravid urged the players to bring their best foot forward in the series as performances in such series will earmark their place in the squad and the history of the game.
"It is a great challenge and a great opportunity for everyone," Dravid said on the eve of the first Test. "It is something you look forward to as a batsman, the chance to play away from home and test yourself against some really good opposition in their home conditions.
"A lot of your career is defined by those sorts of performances, so it is a great opportunity for everyone in the group to put in the performances that are something that they can remember, and people will remember them for."
India have some contentious selection calls to take while deciding their playing XI for the first Test of the series. At first, they have to decide the composition and requirement of their bowling attack to take 20 wickets and after deciding for and against playing an extra bowler, they have to decide who will bat at number five and sixth position in case they decide to play six batsmen.
They had sent Hanuma Vihari to acclimatise with South African conditions and were forced to hand Shreyas Iyer debut after an injury to KL Rahul. Iyer grabbed the opportunity with both hands and scored a match-winning century on Test debut to complicate the selection process tough one to contemplate for the team management. Now, they have to choose between him, Ajinkya Rahane, who was the captain of the side when Iyer made his debut and Vihari for only one spot in the batting order if they decide to play five bowlers.
Dravid conceded the management has to go through “difficult conversations” as almost all players are more than eager to play but reiterated that he always believed in having proper communication with players over their exclusion to keep things sorted inside the dressing room.
"Most players are professional. Sometimes you have to have difficult conversations. Everyone wants to be part of the playing XI, but they understand situations. As long as you can give them the reasons for it (not being selected).
"Players will be disappointed, but that is one of the things that makes people succeed at this level, you want to be playing, competing and part of the action, not sitting out."
Dravid was the first captain to lead an Indian Test side to a win over Proteas in the longest format in 2006 and 15 years later he would be hoping that an Indian team under his watch would go on to win their first Test series in the rainbow nation.