Bharat Arun during a one-on-one with captain Deep Dasgupta on Tuesday. A Telegraph picture

Calcutta: It’s still more than a month for Bharat Arun to officially take charge of the Bengal cricket team. But the former National Cricket Academy coach landed in the city on Tuesday to interact with the players.

After his first — unofficial — day at office, he has managed to pick up three Bengali words. Ami tomake bhalobasi, he says before asking: “Isn’t it the way to begin with?” He adds: “Give me six months and I’ll interact with you in Bengali.”

Having obliged the photographers, Arun had a closed-door session with captain Deep Dasgupta at the B.C. Roy Club House on Tuesday afternoon. His support staff — Piyush Singh (physio), Chinmay Roy (trainer) and Sanjeev Singh (video analyst) — were also present.

The “first-time interaction” with Deep dragged for more than an hour. But there are more such meetings to follow, he said later. The former Indian Test bowler has already chalked out plans for the next five days. He will leave on Monday.

Arun will meet the Bengal players on Wednesday. Ranadeb Bose, currently on national duty in England, will obviously be missed.

“I know most of the players but interacting with them will always help. My work will become a lot easier after I assume charge officially on September 1,” the 44-year-old said.

“Raising the bar” is the first thing on his agenda. “Raising the fitness level, setting-up a good base are the immediate targets.”

He also saw clippings of last year’s Ranji matches from video analyst Sanjeev.

“With technology to help us, we should not leave any stone unturned. I’ll study the players individually through the footage. This will help me in pointing out the key areas to develop. Assigning somebody a particular role will also be easier,” the laptop-wielding coach explained.

Arun has already identified his key players.

“We’ve some very outstanding players… Ranadeb (Bose) has done quite well. Manoj (Tiwary) is very talented and (Avishek) Jhunjhunwala too is quite good. I’m looking forward to help them combine as a team,” he said.