BCCI calls applications for 5 national selectors; ends tenure of Chetan Sharma panel

Mumbai, November 18: Post India’s semifinal exit from the ICC T20 World Cup 2022 in Australia, the BCCI decided to appoint a new national selection panel, as the governing body on Friday (November 18) invited applications for the post of selectors.

The application, as mentioned in a mail by the Board of Control for Cricket in India, includes opening for 5 selectors, naturally one will be the chief of national selectors.

The deadline to file the applications for the posts is November 28, 6 PM IST. It also means that the tenure of the current panel headed by Chetan Sharma has been cut short.

Other than Chetan (North), the other selectors are Sunil Joshi (South), Debasish Mohanty (East), Harvinder Singh (Central). There is an unfilled vacancy of a selector from the West. Abey Kuruvilla was the selector from the West but he had completed the term in 2021 and the post remaiend unfilled till this date.

In the current panel, Mohanty is also close to completing the maximum tenure but others have full term of two years left with them in their four-year term.

The last selection the current panel made was for India's white ball tour to New Zealand and the full-fledged tour to Bangladesh. The current selectors are watching the Vijay Hazare Trophy but they are yet to receive any communication from the BCCI regarding the decision.

It is believed that Chetan was never assertive when it came to certain decisions.

Some of the reasons believed to have led to his sacking are: not being able to have a settled squad, allowing eight international captains in just one year with some select seniors turning workload management into a joke, picking KL Rahul after a eight month hiatus from T20 cricket, going on almost each and every India tour but not being able to create a decisive set of players in co-ordination with team management.

No tangible plan as to whether a 37-year-old senior like Shikhar Dhawan would be carried to 2023 World Cup when he would be above 38 is among the issues that has never been addressed.

Chetan and his team could never reward the domestic or IPL performers and pick specialists across two T20 World Cups.

Theirs is a committee under whom India have lost two T20 World Cup games by 10 wickets, something that has never happened earlier.

That Chetan’s days were numbered was understood when he cut a lonely figure during the T20 World Cup in Australia.

He never travelled with the team and would stand at a fair distance from head coach Rahul Dravid at the end of bowlers’ run-up at the nets.’

The criteria to apply for the post of India selector is as follows. A cricketer should have played a minimum of 7 Test matches, or 30 First-Class matches or 10 ODIs and 20 First-Class matches.

The cricketer should have retired from the game at least 5 years ago and no person who has been a member of any Cricket Committee (as defined in the rules and regulations of BCCI) for a total of 5 years shall be eligible to be a member of Men’s Selection Committee.