It’s been said that failure doesn’t have any fathers, but what’s interesting about this Kolkata story is that there are so many.

Shah Rukh, in his second year as team owner, didn’t understand that sport is different from cinema because it doesn’t follow a script. Both teams are trying to win, and players sometimes need time and trust, rather than constant pressure, to deliver results.

Buchanan, after so many seasons as an international coach, still insisted on reinventing the wheel. The best laid plans on a 14-inch screen amount to nothing without practice, patience and flexibility because a computer can’t go in to bat.

And the think-tank comprising cricket experts of every nature — former players, agents, management gurus — did not select players based on their form and skill-set, so that a proper combination could’ve been out together, but on their ability to enhance the brand.

KKR’s first blunder was in the off-season when they didn’t pick enough Indian batsmen capable of making an impact in the game’s shortest format. Their biggest mistake was siding with Buchanan, even after his four-skipper theory had been laughed away, in a battle for supremacy between him and the team’s skipper.

The captain vs coach debate comes up time and again these days, and the simple answer that the power in cricket — unlike football, hockey and basketball where the workload on an individual player is too much to be burdened with further responsibility — has to be with the captain still hasn’t been accepted as the universal truth despite countless examples in its favour and none against it.

... contd.