'John Buchanan wanted to remove Sourav Ganguly from KKR captaincy,' recalls Aakash Chopra
Former Indian opener Aakash Chopra recalled the time when the then-Kolkata Knight Riders coach John Buchanan wanted to strip Sourav Ganguly of the franchise's captaincy. This event was brought out in the context of the recent development of Grant Flower accusing Younis Khan of pointing a knife to his throat.
Aakash Chopra included this fractured relationship between Sourav Ganguly and John Buchanan as one of the six volatile incidents between a coach and his players, that he talked about on his YouTube channel.
Aakash Chopra, who was a part of the KKR team at the time, stated that the relationship between the coach and the captain was quite good in the initial stages.
"When he came the first year, there was John Buchanan, Ricky Ponting was also there. Sourav Ganguly was the captain and I have seen this from close quarters. The relationship was alright to begin with, it was good at the start."
Aakash Chopra added that it did not take long for the situation to turn bad due to the different styles of functioning of Sourav Ganguly and Buchanan.
"But after that, it did not remain good. Because his way of working was different and Sourav had a different temperament."
The renowned commentator revealed that the relationship had turned so sour that Buchanan wanted to strip Sourav Ganguly of his captaincy.
"In the end, he also wanted to remove Sourav Ganguly from captaincy, which happened the following season. Because in the first season he came at No.6 and in the second season he came at No. 8, when Sourav was not the captain."
Aakash Chopra mentioned that these differences finally led to the ouster of Buchanan as the coach. Although, he did add that some of the things - like the three-captain theory - were blown out of proportion.
"Eventually, John Buchanan had to leave. Some of the things, because I was privy to that, were overstated. Like they said about making 3 captains, that was not the case. See, that's what happens if one thing is wrong there is a Domino effect that everything is wrong, there was nothing good under his leadership."
Aakash Chopra blamed the man-management skills of John Buchanan for the failure of the relationship. He also questioned the coach for carrying a huge entourage of family and friends, even when there was a restriction on the number of players who could travel.
"It was an issue of man management. In fact, the thing in my mind against him was that he had brought together all his close friends, the whole family had come. That did not go down very well. On one side, you were counting the players while taking them and on the other hand a whole family was travelling as part of the support staff."
Aakash Chopra concluded that the whole Sourav Ganguly versus John Buchanan fracas was one of the low points in KKR's IPL history.
"It left a little sour taste. It stands out as a sore thumb in KKR's history."
Sourav Ganguly's record while playing for KKR
Sourav Ganguly played a total of 40 IPL matches for KKR. He scored 1031 runs at a moderate average of 28.63 and a below-par strike rate of 110.50. These runs included seven half-centuries with a highest score of 91.
Dada, as he is affectionately known, captained KKR in 27 matches and had an almost 50% success rate. While the team won 13 matches under Sourav Ganguly's leadership, they ended up on the losing side in the other 14 matches.