Play to thrive, not to survive: Head Coach Vijay Dahiya to team

New Delhi: Ahead of the 2026-27 Ranji Trophy season, the new Delhi Head Coach Vijay Dahiya is instilling in his wards a fresh doctrine -- play to thrive, not to survive.

Delhi have not won the title since 2007-08 and the last time they reached the final was in 2017-18. The experienced Dahiya's return as Head Coach is being seen as Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA)'s desperate move to bring the Ranji Trophy home.

On Tuesday morning at the Ferozeshah Kotla grounds nets, where Kotla 2 was located many years ago, Dahiya was passionately giving a pep talk to Delhi players including Ayush Doseja, Yash Dhull, Sanat Sangwan, Sarthak Ranjan, Dev Lakra among others.

"You cannot move up by playing to survive. You can only move up by playing to thrive," he told the group.

The onus was on bonding the players into a group and playing together as a team, helping each other out.

"It takes a village to make a kid. Sarthak's success will depend on 25 people with the Delhi team (including the support staff and net bowlers there)," Dahiya said while giving an example to the lads.

"You have to play together. If you are at the crease, keep talking to each other, give feedback and guide each other. Don't play for yourself."

One of the things that Delhi lacked in the last few seasons was cohesion and perhaps also a clear target.

"You have to learn to build long innings, take the game deep... If you don't know what you have to do, what is the point," he added.

The Delhi squad, which for a change is of only 16 members this time, has been practising in the pre-season camp for the past week and will depart on Thursday afternoon for Kalyani, where they play Bengal in the season opener from October 11. Wednesday will be the final day of the Kotla camp which has been extensive.

"This is a very extensive camp. Players are getting time to bat for 45 minutes in a session. They are bowling long spells. Vijay has planned it meticulously," said Sanjeev Sharma, one of the two bowling coaches.

Dahiya too impressed upon the players the need to utilise this camp.

"I don't want doubts in the dressing room. Only positivity. You have got to spend a lot of time at these nets. Once the season starts, time will fly. Those six months [making the season] will fly. So these nets are important," he said addressing the players.

Delhi's batting was inconsistent last season. So it wasn't surprising to see Dahiya emphasise on building innings.  Their bowling attack too was suffering from injuries and not at full strength. No wonder Delhi failed to make the knockouts. The pace bowling unit this year is strong with Navdeep Saini, Simarjeet Singh, Divij Mehra and Money Grewal. Additionally, there is the tall pace bowling all-rounder Dev Lakra.

Batting has also been strengthened with the inclusion of Tejasvi Dahiya, who will play as a pure batsman. There have been concerns about the form of Yash Dhull and to an extent skipper Ayush Badoni. Both have struggled to get big scores in recent games. But the pep talk should do them and others a world of good.

Tags : Delhi, Cricket, Vijay Dahiya, Ayush Badoni, Ranji Trophy, Coach