After World Cup exit, India selectors under fire over mysterious selection calls in squad

It was good as long as the results were favourable. Once India lost their semi-final clash against New Zealand at Old Trafford by 18 runs on Wednesday, the uncomfortable questions have started surfacing. The biggest question is over India’s lack of answer to a fragile middle order, even to the extent that they had to fill up crucial batting slots with wicketkeepers-batsmen. Injuries to Shikhar Dhawan and Vijay Shankar and the mysterious reason for not calling up Ambati Rayudu made things worse for a batting order that relied heavily on its top three.

While the MSK Prasad-led selection panel picked Vijay as the No.4 batsman in the squad – ahead of Rayudu who was tested in that position for several months in the run-up to the tournament. It was KL Rahul who became the No.4 batsman after hitting a hundred in the warm-up match against Bangladesh. Prasad had even called Vijay a “three-dimensional” cricketer while picking him over Rayudu, an observation that had attracted an indirect dig from the batsman who has now retired out of angst.

But India’s plan over Rahul again took a twist after Dhawan got a broken thumb during playing against Australia and was ruled out. Rahul was promoted up the order to become Rohit Sharma’s opening partner and the Rahul-Rohit and Virat Kohli line-up became the crux of the Indian batting. The trio kept on delivering throughout the league stage with Rohit slamming five centuries (three of them in consecutive games) and Kohli hitting five back-to-back fifties. Rahul also had a few promising knocks and eventually scored a hundred in the final league match against Sri Lanka.

Big three fell for one run each when it mattered

But all three batsmen fell for just one run each in the all-important semi-final clash against the Kiwis as India were left reeling at 5 for 3 while chasing a competitive target of 240. The moves of sending the inexperienced Rishabh Pant at No.4 and keeping the 350-game- experienced MS Dhoni for No.7 left the fans and experts baffled.

Dhoni scored 50 at No.7 and added 116 runs with No.8 batsman Ravindra Jadeja to take India to victory almost but eventually, they lost by 18 runs. But amid India’s impressive 7-2 record at this World Cup, the chaos over team selection and replacement calls hadn’t gone unnoticed. Particularly, the decision to call Mayank Agarwal, who is yet to make his debut in ODIs, in place of Vijay left many surprised.

This move was made despite Rayudu sitting as a standby cricketer and he called it quits soon after. Things have not gone down well with the BCCI. India TV cited a report to say that a senior BCCI official opining that the selectors must also take responsibility whenever the team loses in a tournament just like that they deserve a monetary reward whenever the team does well.

“When the team wins a tournament, the selectors are given a financial reward for their performance but when the criticism comes after a loss, it is only the players who seem to be criticised. What about the selectors?” the official was quoted as asking.

MSK under fire

“More importantly, what about the chairman of the selection committee? He has been constantly travelling with the team on all tours and surely he must have seen the areas that require attention. The accountability for the No. 4 musical chairs must rest with him since he was the one playing the music.”

The official minced no words saying one couldn’t make ahead of the tail of the replacement calls. He said when an opener gets injured, the team roped in a middle-order batsman as a replacement who should always have been a part of the squad throughout. And then, when the team got a middle-order batsman injured, an opener was brought in as a replacement.

“Who judges whether they are being influenced by other factors or if two selectors are performing better than the others?”

Besides Prasad, the selection committee includes, Devang Gandhi, Gagan Khoda, Jatin Paranjpe and Sarandeep Singh – none of whom had any remarkable career playing for India.