Ploughing through the red tape: Inside Ambati Rayudu’s mission to fix Hyderabad cricket

Rayudu, the Director of Cricket Operations at the Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA), shares that satisfaction but remains wary of premature celebrations.

Hyderabad cricket has heard many speeches, but few came with a tractor.

In the six months since Ambati Rayudu promised to change the culture, the former India batter has been spotted pitch-side at dawn, at a soil vendor’s door in the rain and, by his own count, five to seven kilos lighter.

The initial results suggest that the effort is paying off. The first phase of this Ranji Trophy season has concluded with Hyderabad winning three matches and playing out one draw, enough to put them on top of the Elite Group B table with 20 points. The satisfaction is evident, from players to coaches.

Rayudu, the Director of Cricket Operations at the Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA), shares that satisfaction but remains wary of premature celebrations. He takes greater pride in the systems being put in place.

“I wouldn’t read too much into the results as of now, but I’m very happy with the way the systems are set. And most importantly, the boys are very confident and glad there is something to look forward to,” he told The Hindu.

It is a long way from May 5, when he walked into a hall of cameras and vowed to take Hyderabad cricket to the next level. Plenty of people have made similar promises in those corridors. What followed, Rayudu says, was quieter than the announcement: getting the basics right, every single day.

First, he filled the calendar. Hyderabad’s age-group sides now play far more matches than the league demands, with close to a thousand match days scheduled this season. It is how his own generation grew up.

“When they wake up, if they don’t have a game, they need to be worried: ‘What am I going to do today?’ We wanted to get that feeling back.”

Wasim Jaffer’s arrival as mentor has reinforced the change, helping build a cricketing culture among players and coaches alike. Open trials now allow district players to walk into Gymkhana and compete for a State cap.

From the grassroots to the selection room, no corner of the system has escaped a rethink.

“The first point on our agenda while picking selectors was: Do they have the integrity required? Because beyond that, we will take care of whatever comes. And because they come with such integrity, they are quite adamant and stubborn in their decision making as well. That is a welcome sign because we don’t want them to be yes-men. And they have done a fantastic job, so no complaints at all. All due credit to Jeevan Reddy (HCA secretary) or anybody else, they have never questioned the team selections.”

His Cricket Operations Committee (COC) has stepped in only when it comes to choosing the team’s leadership.

Every selection and omission is recorded on a signed sheet and filed with the Single Member Committee (SMC), headed by retired Justice P. Naveen Rao, along with Jeevan and the COC.

“The sheets have all the details about why a player was selected. In case any issue comes up, everything can be checked. It’s a way to avert any bad calls. It’s just like a Decision Review System (DRS), which helps us avoid blunders. If something comes up in the future, there is always documentation, which over a few years also helps us gather data on what could have been better.”

From a cricket development perspective, Hyderabad’s flat tracks have hardly been anyone’s first choice. They were not Rayudu’s either. With international fixtures returning to the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, domestic hosting duties were restricted to the iconic Gymkhana ground in Secunderabad.

Rayudu had ideas, but first had to contend with several anticipated roadblocks.

“There were so many apprehensions. Funds weren’t getting released sometimes. Tenders were not being opened.”

While the system dragged its feet, Rayudu and head curator Mukesh Kumar did not. Their priority was to find the right soil to redo the pitches.

They waited for vendors who disappeared when the rains arrived, paid extra for earthmovers and chased labourers who never turned up. When no tractors could enter the city, Rayudu arranged for his own.

“Once everything came to the ground, we did not get labour sometimes. There were no tractors that were coming into the city, among other issues. So I brought my own tractor and the person who works on my farm. He is the one who has done all the banks that you see in Gymkhana now.”

Selecting the soil was just as elaborate, involving early-morning trips to neighbouring districts.

“We’ve put in three types of soil. Even the mixed soil used is a natural mix. The soil near Vikarabad naturally gets mixed with red and black, so that is one of the soils that we picked up. There’s also a black soil pitch which is a proper seaming track which, I am sure, will come in handy in the future.”

His benchmark comes from seven seasons at Motibaug with Baroda. A good Ranji Trophy pitch, he explained, should allow teams to bat for around 90 overs while keeping all four innings alive. The toss should not determine the outcome.

The progress has hardly been without resistance. Tight deadlines, uncooperative arms of the bureaucracy and funding troubles came and went, but the COC persevered. On the field, backing local league performers for places in the newly introduced Super League drew criticism from those accustomed to doing things differently.

“What is the worst thing that can happen? They would have all signed a petition to remove us! But by the time that happens, we would have already done a lot of good work.”

Rayudu now looks back on a productive start with satisfaction.

“It was a crazy experience, but we were not going to stop for anybody. It’s not just me. Even Wasim bhai, Mukesh and COC members P.S. Niranjan and M.P. Arjun, they have put in a lot of effort behind the scenes to make all this happen. It’s been a painstaking and stressful one, but for the first time in HCA’s history, I think good is winning over evil.”

The next phase of the overhaul will move beyond Gymkhana. Academies have been planned in Mahabubnagar and Karimnagar, along with a high-performance centre at Uppal, possibly to be run by an outside body under a public-private partnership model. Rayudu hopes to get work started within a month or two. HCA-run teams may also enter different league divisions, giving players identified through open trials a competitive platform.

“We didn’t have time to go into women’s cricket this season,” Rayudu admitted, adding, “It’s just a matter of time that everything will follow in women’s cricket as well. SMC and even Jeevan are very eager to get everything done in the women’s game as well.”

Less than a decade ago, Rayudu took to social media to criticise the way the HCA was being run, making no attempt to mince his words. He admitted that he had never imagined himself being the one to bring about the change he had long wanted to see.

“I thought that there was no hope left. But as they say in India, justice is always delayed, but it is never denied. I wouldn’t say things are perfect right now, not at all. There’s still a long way to go from here, but the processes are being set, there are a lot of systems and protocols that have come into place. Eventually at the end of the season we will release a document on the systems and processes. Once it all gets ratified and if followed, a lot of good will happen in the future.”

Rayudu, whose ambition is to see the HCA among India’s top five associations in both administration and cricket, said he was taking things one year at a time. He has had the support of the SMC and Jeevan throughout his tenure, something he repeatedly credits for what he has managed to achieve in the opening months.

“I told myself that I’ll give everything to Hyderabad cricket for a year. I wanted to sacrifice a year for Hyderabad, which has done so much for me in terms of my cricketing career. Beyond this, I want to set up systems and protocols. The main thing is that SMC needs to be there for at least two or three years. That is very, very important, and along with him Jeevan should be around. I think with them and with these systems, even if I am there or not, it will all run very well.”

It has been a decade since Hyderabad last made the Ranji Trophy knockouts. The team has even experienced life in the Plate division since then. Three wins in four matches represent a promising start, but little more than that. Rayudu and his team have set their sights on an Everest. For now, the first steps are encouraging.