Arunkumar, who was employed in early 2020, needed to wait greater than a yr to truly preside over a match as a result of Covid-19 pandemic. In the final 16 months, his USA groups produced a collection of historic highs on the sector. But in addition they suffered a collection of lows. The lack of consistency finally contributed to Arunkumar’s departure, one thing he acknowledged in his farewell assertion.
“I am very thankful for my time as head coach of the USA Men’s National Team and will leave with plenty of fond memories from nearly three years in charge,” he mentioned in an announcement that the board issued. “I am pleased with the individual and collective progress of the team throughout my time but also disappointed that we couldn’t quite take our opportunities to qualify for a World Cup for the first time or perform more consistently in Cricket World Cup League 2.”
Arunkumar gained a popularity early on as a participant’s coach who was extra a man-manager than an outright tactician. His affect helped renew confidence in veteran gamers like Malhotra, who was one among Arunkumar’s first recalled gamers having been dropped from the USA squad in 2019 and Monank Patel, who took over as USA captain from Saurabh Netravalkar below Arunkumar in 2021.
Arunkumar’s tenure was additionally marked by handing out a big variety of debuts to youthful, typically homegrown skills. But the overwhelming majority have largely did not develop efficiently into changing into USA regulars below his watch. Abhishek Paradkar, Sanjay Krishnamurthi, Kyle Phillip, Yasir Mohammad, Ritwik Behera, Vatsal Vaghela, Sai Mukkamalla and Rahul Jariwala all acquired ODI or T20I debuts for USA since 2021. Yet all however Mukkamalla performed a handful of video games – the 18-year-old performed eight ODIs – earlier than being dropped as USA’s administration quickly defaulted again into the behavior of preferring former abroad professionals.
USA Cricket has already begun its recruitment course of to discover a substitute for Arunkumar.
“Jak’s time at the helm began just as the world was going through the huge difficulties of the Covid pandemic and it wasn’t easy throughout the initial stages of his time in the USA,” mentioned Atul Rai, USA Cricket interim board chairman. “However, he always carried himself professionally and put the best interests of the team first and we would like to wish him well for the future as [he] moves on to new coaching opportunities.”