December 27, 2019
With the balance of power being what it is
As such, the once powerful cricket board, which by nature of its acronym BCCI —
the Board of Control for Cricket in India — is a pale shadow of its erstwhile
self.. Khoda played two ODIs while Paranjpe played four. As we go into combat in
Oz against what appears to be a weak Australian team, we should remember the
post-Kerry Packer series where a mothballed Bob Simpson was drawn out of
hibernation to defeat what appeared to be full-fledged Indian team, we lost the
series 3-2 despite Sunil Gavaskar’s heroics and the collective exploits of B. Or
Raj Singh Dungarpur, who although not a Test cricketer always put his best foot
forward for Indian cricket.J. Between the three Indian cricket selectors, they
have not played too much international cricket — M. Logic says that none of the
five can ever be visualised as standing up to the duo. Very clearly, the troika
of selectors given the width and depth of cricket they have played will be
subaltern to captain Virat Kohli and coach Ravi Shastri.
In the centre is CEO
Rahul Johri, now under the scanner for Hand
roll vacuum compression bags Manufacturers MeToo allegations. Meritocracy
has to be rewarded, extended runs for maladroit and mindless cricketers have to
be consigned to the rubbish heap, performance has to be the only criteria. In
terms of value maximisation, it continues to rake in the big bucks, but cricket
and the directional call that Indian cricket is taking is questionable. The game
cannot be tinkered or tampered with.S. Dilip Vengsarkar batted for a pay hike
for the selectors in 2007. However, in late August, the BCCI reinstated former
Indian players Gagan Khoda and Jatin Paranjpe as senior national selectors after
both were removed in January last year from the selection panel for not being
Test cricketers, as per the requirement set by the Lodha Committee. The first
came in the 1960s and early 1970s when Rod Laver led a tennis renaissance in Oz.
The COA itself is split over CEO Rahul Johri’s predicament, with one trying to
nail him and the other trying to save him.K.Indian cricket has come a long way
from Vijay Merchant using a casting vote to make Ajit Wadekar India captain in
place of Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi after a decade-long stint as the helmsman.
K.
Many hailed him as the most significant player since Donald Bradman in
Australian cricket history. Here again the Aussies scrapped with second and
third-rung players till they formed a cohesive unit under AB — Allan Border.
Equally, systems and processes cannot be compromised. Both were, however, being
paid as per their contract, as they could only be removed officially in the
board’s AGM. The captain and the coach are invited to the selection committee
meetings to present their opinions on team players though they don’t have voting
rights in team selection. Some of the on-field and administrative decisions
taken by the team management in England cannot be allowed in any democratic
setup.
The erstwhile five-member zonal system was scrapped by the Justice Lodha
Committee. Kohli and Shastri can turn this storyboard around by being more
accommodating, flexible and ductile. By constantly gearing yourselves using an
echo chamber, you can delude yourself, but the question is for how long.
According to the income-tax department, only 1. Chandrasekhar, Bishan Singh Bedi
and Erapalli Prasanna. While Kohli in an interview on the eve of the tour to
Australia said that Shastri is not his yes man, their combined decision-making
skill has cost India dear many times. On the other side is the cricket board —
uncertain, manacled and fettered by the Supreme Court. The effete selection
panel doesn’t cut any ice, Paranjpe’s contemporaries in Mumbai cricket were Ajit
Agarkar and Raju Kulkarni, who played much more international cricket than
him.
With the balance of power being what it is, important things are slipping
through the cracks. It is a situation that the coach-captain duo revel in, for
there is a distinct lack of checks and balances.K. Khanna and a Rahul Johri
embroiled in #MeToo are failing all of us. Prasad, Sarandeep Singh and Devang
Gandhi after the Supreme Court modified the Lodha reforms and reinstated five
selectors in the national panel. Power is vested in two individuals in Indian
cricket — Ravi Shastri and Virat Kohli — coach and captain respectively. Indian
cricket is bigger than all those who have served it well, for you play under the
aegis of the national flag.
India’s multiple cricket administrators have to
understand that you can’t teach a cat how to go and fetch. Australians play
sport with great pride. In the power vacuum that exists in Indian cricket,
various people are making merry. Cricket savants were shocked at the weak-kneed
response from the administrators. Since then Mark Taylor, Steve Waugh, Ricky
Ponting and Michael Clarke have given Australian cricket new direction to become
world beaters. Australian teams have always been all-conquering. Laver, Ken
Rosewall, John Newcombe, Roy Emerson, Mal Anderson, Geoff Masters and Colin
Dibley became the dominant tennis nation in the world, winning Slams and the
Davis Cup conclusively. Joe Root’s England has just triumphed over Sri Lanka,
vanquishing them with a trinity of spinners.
Akbar can lose their high-profile
jobs, why this attempt to save Johri? Actually it should be incumbent on him to
quit and walk into the sunset. The South African tour was salvaged with
victories in the abbreviated versions, while in England more or less the entire
tour was an unmitigated fiasco. The second was when Kerry Packer debilitated the
game by turning cricketers into mercenaries and launching World Series Cricket
with all top-notch Australian players walking # out. The primacy of cricket is
well established in Australia, barring two periods of decline and near demise.
The power vested in Shastri and Kohli has to be toned down, yes men have to be
filtered out.
Mark Taylor gave Australian cricket new calling by zoning in on
the baggy green, while Allan Border took guard to rebuild a hurt nation’s pride.
I am not challenging Shastri or Kohli for their patriotism, both have been great
servants of Indian cricket, but with the democratisation of Indian cricket where
players from Ranchi to Assam to Odisha to Kerala to J&K have played with
great distinction, it is time to enlarge the scope of selection and team
management. Now the selectors, after the latest August decision, get paid Rs 90
lakhs per annum, while the chief selector gets Rs 1 crore. The game’s primacy
and paramountcy cannot be disputed; transparency has to be the norm, opacity is
dangerous. Now that is a humongous number, a corporate salary. This is nobody’s
private fiefdom — we play for India. Ravi Shastri and Virat Kohli.Cricket
savants were shocked at the weak-kneed response from the administrators.
Too
much aggression, constant tinkering with personnel, square pegs in round holes,
needless persistence with substandard cricketers and more than anything else,
runation of Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane’s Test career progression —
acts of commission and omission with no deterrence whatsoever. Prasad (chairman)
played six Tests and 17 ODIs, Devang Gandhi played four Tests and three ODIs and
Sarandeep Singh played three Tests and five ODIs.40 lakh assessees declare
income of over Rs 1 crore per annum in India. When you move the furniture
around, it stubs toes and people get hurt. It is a lacunae staring Vinod Rai in
the face and he, along with acting president of a crippled BCCI C.While the
Supreme Court cleaned the Augean stables at the BCCI and they deserve thanks for
dispensing with the zamindari and jagirdari system that prevailed in Indian
cricket for years at end, the current system is still flawed.
The 1977-78 series
saw a virtual second XI led by 41-year-old Simpson with one genuine great in
Jeff Thomson take on India.S. From the best touring team ever to no
international team tours well is a scathing indictment of this journey into an
abyss of desolation. The power structure that runs Indian cricket is at its most
fragile and a result of this is the emasculation of the selection committee. The
CEO is embroiled in a potboiler and the inquisition committee is muddled in its
thinking.S. If not, then far bigger men have been replaced in the whirligig —
Tiger lost his job as did Sachin Tendulkar and Ajit Wadekar, both Gavaskar and
Kapil Dev alternated exiting in and out of revolving door.
Under the
new cricket setup in India, only three selectors were appointed, with one of
them being the chairman. Khoda and Paranjpe thus rejoined chief selector M. Some
of the decision-making between the "pall bearers†remains suspect and completely
hair-brained. One the one hand is the committee of administrators appointed by
the Supreme Court — now down to two from four with only Vinod Rai and Diana
Edulji surviving after Ramachandra Guha and Vikram Limaye quit for different
reasons. When Binny Bansal and M
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