CAC request to be involved in support staff appointment

The three-member CAC panel at the media briefing to announce India men's coach, in Mumbai. © AFP

Kapil Dev, head of the Cricket Advisory Committee that reappointed Ravi Shastri as India head coach, has insisted that his three-member panel (Dev, Anshuman Gaekwad and Shanta Rangaswamy) be involved in the selection of the support staff as well. Dev revealed that BCCI CEO Rahul Johri was apprised of the CAC's request to be involved in the process to appoint Shastri's assistants - batting, bowling and fielding coaches.

As per the new BCCI constitution registered in line with the Lodha directives, the interview process of the support staff will have to be helmed by the national selection committee, which is headed by MSK Prasad. It is understood that Prasad and Co. were planning on interviewing prospects between August 19 to 22, following the appointment of the head coach.

"We should have a role as well," Dev said at a press conference on Friday (August 16). "If you ask me I personally feel, and we've given a letter to BCCI as well. We've put it in black and white, in the minutes, that it is not right that we're not doing that job also," said Dev.

He went on to add that he'd like to work together with the selection panel. "It should not be a communication gap. Their strength and our strength is the same for the team. We want to make sure that the team gets benefitted. That's what we wanted and if we can help them and chairman of selection committee and his team can help," Dev added.

The apparent confusion over the process carries forward from the previous instance of the head coach appointment, in July 2017 by then CAC comprising Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman. On that instance, the trio recommended Rahul Dravid and Zaheer Khan for the positions of batting and bowling consultants respectively.

Eventually, those support staff recommendations were rendered void with the renewals of contracts for Sanjay Bangar (batting coach), Bharat Arun (bowling coach) as well as for R. Sridhar (fielding coach), who had previously worked in a coaching team with Shastri.

"He [The head coach] should have some say in the whole process for sure," former India pacer Zaheer Khan opined on CricbuzzLive, when asked if the support staff selection should take place independently. "For any coach it is important to have the support system around him which is in-sync with his thought process. If you have people going in different directions in that platform, then it's just going to have repercussions filtering down to the team. I think some kind of say is important that coach should have, he is the captain of the ship."

While Bharat Arun is widely expected to hold on to his position given India's evolution as a potent bowling team, incumbent batting coach Bangar faces challenges from several applications including former India internationals Vikram Rathour and Praveen Amre. Jonty Rhodes is a prominent candidate for the post of the fielding coach.