Former Indian World Cup-winning captain Kapil Dev reckons if a player has passion then they will not feel any kind of pressure. Dev believes players of his generation used to enjoy playing the sport and thus there was no pressure.

However, it is a new era and the IPL has revolutionized the sport. Dev believes if players feel pressure while playing in the IPL then they should not play in the lucrative league.

The IPL has given a lot of exposure to the young players and they have also grabbed their chances. However, the pressure of the price tag is not always easy to handle for the players and many players have succumbed to it.

“I hear a lot of times on TV that there’s a lot of pressure on players to play in the IPL. Then I only say one thing, don’t play. If a player has passion, there will be no pressure. I can’t understand these American terms, like depression. I’m a farmer and we play because we enjoy the game, and there can’t be any pressure while enjoying the game,” Kapil said while talking to ‘Champions of Aakash’ at Taj Palace.

Dev also compared his generation with the current era and revealed that there was a lot of strictness in his school.

“I remember going to a school where students of class 10 and 12 told him they face a lot of pressure. I said, ‘So also face pressure!’. You people sit in air-conditioned rooms with fees paid by your parents, and teachers cannot beat you up, then where is this pressure coming from? Ask me what pressure is all about. Teachers used to beat us up and then would ask where we had gone.”

Meanwhile, many players like Virat Kohli, Glenn Maxwell, and Ben Stokes have admitted that they have faced tough times because of their mental health.

On the other hand, India will begin their T20 World Cup campaign against Pakistan at the MCG on 23rd October.