Chairman of the Committee of Administrators (COA) that ran Indian cricket until last year's BCCI elections, Vinod Rai, revealed that the panel had initially approached former India captain Rahul Dravid for the post of the national team's head coach. 

Dravid, the then India 'A' & U-19 coach, however, declined the offer, preferring to instead spend more time with his family. 

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The approach took place in the aftermath of Anil Kumble's resignation from his post only one year into his job in 2017 citing "untenable" relationship with skipper Virat Kohli. 

Rai said the COA wanted Dravid to take over, before he decided otherwise. 

"Rahul was very upfront with us," Rai told SportsKeeda. "He said, ‘look I have two boys growing up at home and I have been travelling with the Indian team all over the world and I am not able to give time and attention to them, I think I must stay at home also. And give time to my family'."

"I think that was a very fair request and though he would have been uppermost in mind. So, he was very much in the zone of consideration," he added. 

Dravid, Rai said, was keen to continue developing young talent at the U-19 & 'A' level, which paved way for Ravi Shastri to be appointed head coach by the Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC) that was constituted. Rai said it was still a win-win situation as the COA felt one right candidate replaced the other after Kumble's departure.

"Look, in terms of potential for coaching, Dravid, Shastri and Kumble are the best in the business," Rai said. "We definitely talked to Rahul. He was engaged with the Under-19 team and he was involved with them. He had developed a road map on how to develop a team. He was bringing out fantastic results. He wanted to continue because he felt that there were some unfinished tasks with that team and he wanted to do it."

Dravid was last year elevated for a more wholesome job of being the head of the National Cricket Academy (NCA), from where he also supervises the happenings within the U-19 & 'A' set-ups. 

"Dravid is a head coach at NCA. He was very kind and very gracious in accepting that and committing himself to the NCA," Rai said. 

Also last year, Shastri was reinstated in his position for another two-year term lasting till the 2021 T20 World Cup in India.