Chandrakant Pandit's appointment as KKR coach is first-class news: Sunil Gavaskar

Chandrakant Pandit at the MCA-BKC ground last month. Pic/Sameer Markande

One of the best cricketing news to come out in the last few days was the BCCI's decision to have a full season of Ranji Trophy matches. Last year, as you know, thanks to the pandemic, the teams were divided into groups of four and could only play three matches at the league stage. The year, before that, there was no Ranji Trophy at all. This was particularly hard on a lot of players since they depended solely on the income that they got from playing the Ranji Trophy.

Jobs drying up

In the not-so-distant past, the players had the cushion of a corporate job which covered the income in case they were not picked to play Ranji Trophy. But in recent times, jobs have dried up because with the packed international season not just the top players, but even the fringe players are not available to play for the corporates with the result the Ranji Trophy income has become the sole means of livelihood for so many.

The BCCI has come up with a very good formula for the Ranji Trophy fees, where those who have played more are rewarded by being given a bigger match fee. This is a very good move because it encourages participation rather than the player giving some flimsy excuse to skip the Ranji Trophy match.

This year hopefully the Board will double the match fees. After all, the BCCI has made a killing with the IPL broadcast and digital platform fees which is many times more than the previous contract. Now with the doubling of the fees, the Ranji player should get much more than the bottom-most IPL player fee if he plays all the seven league games. If he is fortunate to be part of a team that qualifies for the knockouts and even wins the Ranji Trophy, he will get additional games plus the participation fee for the Irani Cup. If he is good enough to be picked for the Duleep Trophy, the Vijay Hazare Trophy and the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy and if he has played more matches in the past, his earnings for the season could well reach between Rs 40-50 lakh. That will be a true reward for making himself available to play in the national championships, the Ranji Trophy. For far too long the Ranji Trophy player has felt like the poor cousin in Indian cricket despite playing twice as many days of domestic cricket than the IPL player who plays a maximum of 16 days of cricket. It will be wonderful when the BCCI Annual General Meeting takes place later in the year, the increase of fees for the Ranji player will be one of the main items on the agenda.

Pandit's KKR challenge

The other news that was most heartening was the appointment of Chandrakant Pandit as coach of the Kolkata Knight Riders. Pandit has a terrific record where he has taken unfancied teams to the Ranji title. Whether he will be able to replicate that with KKR remains to be seen, but the move to appoint him as coach needs to be lauded as it is finally recognising that Indian coaches will know more about Indian players than the overseas coaches, who won't have an idea of many a young Indian talent. Indian coaches like Ravi Shastri, Bharat Arun, R Sridhar to name just three have shown over the years what they can achieve. In the IPL, seven out of the playing XI have to be Indians and only Indian coaches or assistant coaches will be able to identify the talent so that the best possible XI takes the field.

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Even as Pandit's appointment was being hailed pretty much around the whole country, it was disappointing to hear some doubt his style of coaching. Where did these people experience his style of coaching if they haven't been in the same team and change room that Pandit coached? Just going by hearsay is palpably unfair to someone who has achieved so much. In any case, where are these people when overseas players who have just retired are appointed as coaches or assistant coaches? Why don't they then question the capability of these overseas coaches? We have seen in recent times so many retired overseas players with zero coaching experience being inducted by the franchisees in their support staff. Where are these Indian voices then? Why don't they question the capability of the overseas support staff?

Don't doubt Chandu

India got its independence 75 years back when we finally got together as one and drove the British out. But before that, for many a century, the Indian pulling a fellow Indian down was the reason we were ruled by outsiders for so long. Seventy five years after Independence, sadly in cricket we see something similar happening. Pandit may well end up with his team at the bottom. Then, surely you can question his capability. But now as fellow Indians let us give him a fair chance and not pull him down even before the first ball of next year's IPL is bowled.

Professional Management Group