Paul Thomas and Sharda Ugra: John Wright's Indian Summers

Forget about retailing and sales, cricket is the only career where the clock doesn't crawl for John Wright. Picture / Greg Bowker

John Wright might be keeping mum on his prospects as New Zealand coach, but supporters can take heart from his latest autobiographical offering, Indian Summers.

The man who confounded all predictions when he was appointed Indian coach in 2000, and again when he survived in the role for five years, makes it clear in the book that he doesn't want to work outside the game again.

That should be encouraging news for Wright fans, who could yet see their man taking over the coaching reins from John Bracewell after next April's World Cup tournament, when the position is next assessed.

Indian Summers covers the last few years of Wright's playing career and his coaching experiences with Kent and India, and is an almost seamless sequel to his first autobiography, the acclaimed, Christmas in Rarotonga.

It begins with his recall as a replacement for the bomb-stricken tour of Sri Lanka in 1992, details his post-career blues - and something he calls limelight deprivation syndrome - and examines his forays into the world of sales and retail.

These included stints at Fletcher Challenge and Placemakers, where he refined the art of hiding from customers and bluffing tradesmen, at Wrightsons Bloodstock, and at Ernest Adams, where he has the distinction of being the only employee to fire a 12-gauge shotgun inside a company car.

"It's not until you have a real job and you're sitting in an office looking at the clock and realising that only two minutes have passed since you last looked, that you really get it," he explains.

"You feel a loss bordering on resentment, that you're no longer involved. Cricket seems to be getting on just fine without you; in fact, its almost as if you're career never happened.

"One day you're having those last-minute chats with the selectors and tactical discussions with the captain, the next an old lady's asking you for a dozen pozi screws."

Wright started to appreciate more that old W.H. Auden quote that says the one prerequisite for all works of art and for scientific innovation, no matter how great or small, is intensity of attention. Or less pompously, love.

He reasoned that to succeed at anything, you had to work bloody hard, and that if you didn't love it, the chances were that you'd struggle to do the work.

So when he received an inquiry from Kent in 1997 asking him if he was interested in the county coaching position, he knew what he needed to do.

"I didn't have to think about it," he said. "Business, particularly the cake business wasn't my thing; for better or worse, cricket was. I couldn't wait to get back to it."

Hope yet then, that Wright might still want a final hurrah with New Zealand, and that he's just taking a breather in Canterbury, getting used to a world without a billion onlookers.

Not that he hasn't already thrown his hat into the ring. Indian Summers dedicates several pages to his disappointment in 1999, when he was encouraged to apply for the New Zealand position vacated by Steve Rixon, only to finish an also-ran to David Trist.

Wright was furious at the way the then chief executive, Chris Doig, and chairman Sir John Anderson made their decision before he had a face-to-face interview, and bewildered about being summoned to London when there was obviously no need for the trip.

He didn't know it at the time, but Doig and Anderson could hardly have done him a bigger favour.

As Trist's New Zealand side disintegrated in South Africa in 2000 - to the extent that the coach decided against renewing his contract when it had six months still to run - Wright was beginning the journey of a lifetime in India.

He well remembers the initial challenges, particularly at the first Indian practice session, when the players left their gear on the bus for porters to handle and ambled over to the nets, where they lounged on cane chairs while waiters served tea and biscuits.

Trying to protect the teams dressing room and viewing areas from self-important VIPs and officials (and their families, friends and guests) was another hurdle for the new coach, as was the task of trying to increase player fitness.

On the few occasions the players ran, Wright says, they set a pace that a tortoise with a double-hip replacement would have found comfortable.

Indian Summers also examines in depth India's epic home test series win against Steve Waugh's Australians in 2001, when the hosts were beaten in the first test, forced to follow-on before winning the second, and then secured the third test at Kolkata, thanks mainly to Harbhajan Singh's 15 wickets.

It gives Wright's keen observations as he adjusted to life on the sub-continent, living out of two suitcases for the full five years.

There is comedy aplenty throughout, as well as poignant pieces about the loneliness of the road, the agony of being separated from your children, and the overwhelming congestion of humanity.

But mostly it tells the highly enjoyable story of Wright's adventures in one of the world's most fascinating regions, and how he came to love the utter craziness of the people, the land and the culture.

As he says: "When I finish with cricket in a professional capacity and get back to watching it purely for pleasure, I won't bother going to Lord's; I'll go back to India."

* Publisher: Hachette Livre

* RRP: $49.99