After dropping a bombshell about interference in selection matters, former national selector Mohinder Amarnath named BCCI president N. Srinivasan as the person who overruled the “unanimous” decision to replace Mahendra Singh Dhoni as captain after India’s eight consecutive overseas Test defeats.
“It was a unanimous decision, all five selectors supported it. The Board President (Srinivasan) did not approve the unanimous decision to replace Mahendra Singh Dhoni,” Amarnath told CNN-IBN.
“Why do you need a selection committee there if one person needs to be at the helm of affairs? We should not be there. Who knows the constitution of BCCI? Is the current selection committee aware of it? I was not aware of the constitution of BCCI” he said.
“We are working on trust there and we are doing our job honestly. It was a unanimous decision of the selection committee to replace Dhoni with somebody after the disastrous series in Australia,” he said.
Amarnath, who played 69 Tests and 74 one-dayers for India, said the selection committee had picked 17 players for the tri-series but had not named a captain.
“We selected the team for the triangular series, selected 17 players but we didn’t select the captain. The captain was selected by somebody else,” Amarnath, one of India’s heroes in the 1983 World Cup triumph, said.
Asked about the specific reasons behind Srinivasan’s non-approval, Amarnath answered, “When you respect a person, you don’t ask questions...but my question here is you have a selection committee those who think what is best for Indian cricket then why are they not given free hand?
“We were trying to look ahead, we wanted a young captain to come in specially in triangular one day series so that we can go ahead and do something better in near future....If we don’t look ahead, we won’t have a good team in near future.”
Amarnath however did not want to drag the Chennai Super Kings angle into the issue.
“The Chennai Super Kings does not come into this. This is between captain and Mr Srinivasan. I have nothing to say on that. I’m not in favour or against anything like that,” he added.
PTI
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