No meeting to re-appoint Virat Kohli as captain upsets Sunil Gavaskar

Former great Sunil Gavaskar recently took a strong dig at the national selection committee headed by MSK Prasad accusing it of “bypassing the procedure” while re-appointing Virat Kohli as the captain. While there was speculation after India’s exit from the cricket World Cup that a split captaincy could be followed hereafter for Tests and the limited-over versions, Kohli was eventually retained. Gavaskar, who recently turned 70, was not happy the way the Indian captain was confirmed.

In his fortnightly column in Mid-Day newspaper, Gavaskar expressed his displeasure over the fact that the selection panel picked the team for the West Indies without first having met to select the skipper. He hence asked whether Kohli is the captain of the team at the pleasure of himself or the selection committee. Kohli was reportedly rested for the T20Is and ODIs in the Caribbeans but he later confirmed his participation in the entire series.

“To the best of our knowledge, his (Kohli’s) appointment was till the World Cup. After that, it was incumbent on the selectors to meet even if it was for five minutes for his reappointment,” the legendary former batsman said in his column. He even blasted the selection committee as “lame ducks”. The Prasad-led panel has already come under some heavy criticism over their pick of players for the World Cup. Gavaskar’s take will make it even heavier.

‘Captain continues despite team’s below expectations’

“Speaking of lame ducks, the Indian selection committee appears to be one. After the reappointment, he (captain) gets invited to the meeting for his views on selecting the players for the team. By bypassing the procedure, the message that goes out is that while the players like Kedar Jadhav, Dinesh Karthik get dropped after below expectations performance, the captain continues despite much below par expectations where the team did not even reach the finals,” Gavaskar added.

Gavaskar, who is the first man on earth to score 10,000 Test runs, also took a dig at the international experience of the members in the selection committee. Besides Prasad who is a former wicket-keeper, the members are former spinner Sarandeep Singh, former batsmen Devang Gandhi, Gagan Khoda and Jatin Paranjape. The last two have only played in ODIs.