Gautam Gambhir aims a dig at Bishan Bedi and Chetan Chauhan over Navdeep Saini's selection

It was  Gautam Gambhir, who had first noticed Navdeep Saini's bowling skills at the net during a trial in 2013. Prior to that, Saini had never bowled with the red ball and it was only upon Gambhir’s insistence that he had got the confidence to try it. The former Indian bowler was understandably blown away by his talent and was also quite angry at the DDCA selectors who didn’t even give a passing glance to the player despite Gambhir’s insistence, as the player hailed from Haryana.

Saini was taken into the Ranji side purely on Gambhir’s call when he first played against Vidarbha at Roshanara Cricket Ground, and the rest, as they say, is history. After some successful domestic seasons, Saini eventually got his reward after Mohammed Shami was excluded from India’s Test squad after his failure to complete Yo-Yo Test.

And now with his unearthed gem finally wearing the India white jersey, Gambhir couldn’t resist a dig at the DDCA members who had once considered the player an outsider. In one of his Twitter post concerning Saini, the southpaw tagged Bishan Bedi and Chetan Chauhan, two DDCA officials, who had criticised him on backing Navdeep Saini’s recruitment in the Ranji team.

Outside the DDCA, Bedi had also addressed a letter to DDCA President Arun Jaitley, questioning him if a player outside Delhi or NCR was even eligible to play in the team. But it couldn't stop Gambhir, who was the captain of Delhi’s Ranji trophy team in 2013, in picking Saini. For this, the DDCA’s Sports Working Committee had immediately issued a statement of disapproval.

“A player who does not belong to Delhi, does not even play league cricket from any club of DDCA, has been included in the first XI against Vidarbha,” the statement read.