Kumar Kushagra’s father shares how he trained his sone from the age of six and helped him earn his maiden India call-up for the New Zealand ODI series.
Published: October 17, 2026, 8:57 PM IST
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https://www.india.com/sports/cricket/kumar-kushagras-father-reveals-how-he-trained-his-son-for-india-call-up-8536952/
Kumar Kushagra’s journey to India call-up (Image – X)
Shashikant Kumar Kushagra does not remember his son, Kumar Kushagra, showing much interest in cricketShashikant, who works as a GST officer in Jamshedpur, decided to introduce his son to the gameHe did not do this to fulfil his own dream or because he saw special talent in his sonInstead, he was inspired by how cricket changed MS Dhoni’s life 15 years ago.
“If you see the world, everything is in cricket — fame, name, good lifestyleEverything you could ask for is there in cricketSo, I thought we must create some new things in life,” Shashikant tells The Indian Express.
When Kumar Kushagra was just six years old, his father, Shashikant, started teaching him cricketEven though the family was well-off, he did not send Kumar to a cricket academyInstead, he decided to train his son himself, despite having no experience in the game.
Shashikant wanted his son to play for India one dayAfter 15 years of hard work, his dream is now closer to coming trueKumar has received his first call-up to the Indian team and has been named in the ODI squad for the last two matches of the upcoming New Zealand series“It is a puzzle for me all these years,” Shashikant says.
“Kumar had no interest in cricketBut I made him playAt times while growing up, he wouldn’t even listen, but I would force him, saying, ‘You have to play by any means’That’s how he used to batI never played cricket in my lifeI hadn’t even touched a bat, nor touched a ballBut my intention was that we have to do such a thing in the world where people would look at usEven if he wasn’t interested, we still wanted to make him a cricketer and I knew how to make him one,” he added.
Before teaching Kumar cricket, Shashikant first learned the game himselfHe read cricket books by Bob Woolmer and Don Bradman to understand batting betterHe wrote down different shots in simple words so that he and his son could understand and practice them easily.
“I never sent him to any academy, because it just takes a lot of time away from youWe thought that since we have to make him succeed very quickly, we ourselves read all the booksI read all the big cricketers’ books, also those of Bob Woolmer and also whatever other books there wereWe extracted points and worked out every shot, how this shot happens, how that shot happensWhen it came to pull shot, we would write down the different ways to play it and similarly for the drives.”
