Dilip Vengsarkar discloses that backing Virat Kohli in 2008 led to his removal as chief selector
Former chief selector Dilip Vengsarkar has revealed that he was sacked from his role at the national selection committee in 2008 when he advocated for the inclusion of Virat Kohli ahead of Subramaniam Badrinath. The move didn’t go down well with the then BCCI president N. Srinivasan.
After Indian Under-19 team, under the leadership of Kohli, won the U-19 World Cup, national selectors had a close eye on the performance of the youngsters and Kohli also backed it up with good performance in the Ranji Trophy. It was the Emerging Nations Cup in Australia where Kohli played
However, his inclusion meant India had to leave out Badrinath from the squad for the Test and ODI squads for the Sri Lanka tour, but the Tamil Nadu player had the backing of N. Srinivasan, who restricted the former national chief selector from bringing in Kohli into the squad."I felt this was an ideal situation to include Kohli in the squad. Although the other four selectors agreed with my decision, Gary Kirsten and MS Dhoni were reluctant as they had not seen much of Kohli. I told them that I have seen him and we have to include him in the team,” Vengsarkar said in a function in Mumbai, reported TOI.
“I knew that they were keen on keeping S Badrinath in the team because he was a Chennai Super Kings player. If Kohli would have come in, Badrinath would have been dropped. N Srinivasan was the BCCI treasurer at that time. He was upset that Badrinath was dropped because he was their player.”While Vengsarkar, who featured in 116 Tests and 129 ODIs for India, replaced Kiran More as the chief selector of the Indian senior cricket team in 2006, he was sacked from the role and his former team-mate Kris Srikkanth, who belongs to Tamil Nadu, the same state as Srinivasan, took over the duty in 2008. After taking the brave decision of handing Kohli a debut, the now Indian skipper didn’t disappoint him and scored 12, 37, 25, 54 and 31 in the first five matches.
"He asked me on what basis Badrinath was axed, and I explained that I had been on the Emerging Players tour to Australia where I saw Virat, who is an exceptional player and that is why he is in the team. He argued that Badrinath has scored over 800 runs for Tamil Nadu. I told him that he will get his chance. He then asked, 'When will he get his chance? He is already 29 now'. I told him he will get his chance but I can't tell you when. The very next day, he (Srinivasan) took (Kris) Srikkanth, who later succeeded Vengsarkar as chief selector, to Sharad Pawar, who was the (BCCI) president then and that was the end of my selection tenure," Vengsarkar claimed.