'Our culture is hero worship culture' - MSK Prasad responds to criticism he faced during his tenure as chief selector

The MSK Prasad-led selection committee was under the radar the most among all the panels in the Indian cricket over the last few years. A lot of questions were raised on the chief selector’s capability as well. Rather the fact that Prasad has only played 6 Tests and 17 ODIs was brought up time and again to bring him down. Another stinging criticism had come from Farokh Engineer who claimed that one of the selectors was serving tea to Anushka Sharma in England during the World Cup.

But during his time at the helm, Prasad seldom reacted to all such comments. However, he has opened up now on the matter and feels that India is a hero worship culture and people feel that a player who has played for so many years only knows everything about the game. He also cited that being selector is a purely management skills and it has nothing to do with the matches one has played in his/her career.

Rather MSK Prasad also gave an example stating that a cricketer who has played more than 100 Tests has also failed as the chairman of selectors. So it is not necessary that only those who featured in more matches for their country would make a good selector. “Our culture is hero worship culture. Whoever has played lot of cricket, they treat them as the guys who know everything, they may not be know-it-all guys.

“Every field requires its own credentials and its own fundamentals. Selection committee is more about management skills. I’ll give an example, there’s a guy who has played more than 100-120 Tests, not talking about our country, they were miserable failure as chairman of selectors, so does that mean that the guy who has played a lot of cricket knows it all? No!” he said while speaking to Fancode.

MSK Prasad points out Sachin Tendulkar’s coach hadn’t played one FC game

MSK Prasad further pointed out Sachin Tendulkar‘s success in the sport and highlighted that his coach Ramakant Achrekar didn’t play a single first-class game. But even then he went on produce one of the best cricketers in the world. Citing the example, the 45-year-old mentioned that the requirements of every field are different and people give their 100% accordingly.

“Simple example: The coach who made god of Indian cricket has never played a single first-class game, that speaks it all. So every field has its own requirement and I am sure that within the given opportunity, we try to give our level best,” Prasad added.