The story of the explosive collar-grabbing incident has been doing the round recently and has raised a few eyebrows. Some even accused of John Wright of leaking dressing-room stories. But the incident was first revealed by Rahul Dravid in the May 2005 iss

Cricinfo staff16-Aug-2006

‘I will miss looking at John’s face when somebody plays a bad shot during a tight match. It was something’ – Virender Sehwag on the former coach © Getty Images
The story of the collar-grabbing incident, when John Wright confronted Virender Sehwag during the NatWest Trophy in 2002, has been doing the rounds again, courtesy extracts from Wright’s recently-launched book, . It has raised quite a few eyebrows, some even accusing Wright of leaking dressing-room stories. But the incident was revealed by Rahul Dravid as far back as May 2005 in .Dravid talks about Wright’s mood before that Sehwag dismissal, how the coach felt frustrated by Sehwag’s “silly shots” and how he intended to “have a go” at Sehwag if he got out in the same manner again. “This happened at The Oval during the NatWest Trophy. John [Wright] had been talking to us about how Viru [Virender Sehwag] was batting really well, playing great shots, but also playing silly shots and getting out. That was getting to John. He said to me, ‘If that guy gets out to one more bad shot I’m going to really have a go at him.’ In the next match Viru went out and played a silly shot and got out. And when he walked back into the dressing-room, John actually grabbed him by the collar and shook him. It created a bit of stir in the dressing room. The thing was the incident was quickly forgotten and neither Viru nor anyone else took offense. We knew how badly he wanted Viru and the team to do well. We knew it frustrated him when people did not play up to their potential. It was an incident that showed us just how badly he wanted us to win. There were absolutely no hard feeling after the incident; and perhaps he and Viru got on much better after that, if anything.”In the same issue of WAC, Virender Sehwag also heaped praise on Wright, saying how “he was more of a friend”. “Our culture teaches us to respect our elders and with someone like a coach you need to be particular about your behaviour. But with John it was different: he was more of a friend. We could laugh at him, plays pranks. But he was also a thorough professional, very demanding, and very passionate about what he did. More than anything, he was very good at understanding the character of a player. When people doubted my abilities, John was aware of my mental strengths and never talked about altering my batting technique. In fact, on playing days our interaction was minimal. He has a back problem and he knows that my mom has a bad back too. On match days he would ask me, ‘How are you? How’s your mom’s back? How are we going to play today?’ I will never forget one thing he told us: the difference between a good player and a great player is performance. Great ones perform consistently and good ones do it off and on. And I will miss looking at John’s face when somebody plays a bad shot during a tight match. It was something.”