By Vivek Prabhakar Singh
New Delhi [India], December 28 (ANI): The Board of Management for Cricket in India (BCCI) secretary Devajit Saikia denied speculations of Indian batting legend VVS Laxman being approached to be males’s staff subsequent Check coach as ‘factually incorrect and baseless’, saying that the board has not taken any steps relating to change of management group within the longest format of the sport.
The media stories of Laxman being approached to turn out to be India’s subsequent Check coach has been doing the rounds. The information comes just some weeks after India suffered a 0-2 Check whitewash to South Africa at dwelling underneath Gautam Gambhir, their second whitewash in back-to-back years following a humiliating 0-3 loss to New Zealand final 12 months underneath the identical coach, which marked India’s first Check sequence loss at dwelling since 12 years and beginning of crumbling of India’s nice Check empire, guarded nicely by leaders like MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma for over a decade.
The NZ whitewash value a as soon as well-settled India a spot within the ICC World Check Championship 2025 last, and the most recent setback to the Proteas may additionally find yourself costing them a berth within the marquee one-off Check championship conflict, relying on how additional outcomes go.
Talking to ANI, Saikia mentioned, ‘That is completely incorrect information happening. That is completely speculative information. Some very reputed information businesses are additionally flashing the information. There isn’t a reality to it. BCCI right away denies. Folks can suppose all they need, however BCCI has not taken any steps. That is any person’s figment of creativeness; there isn’t any reality in it, and I can not say something besides that that is factually incorrect and baseless information.’
Whereas Staff India has been doing extraordinarily nicely underneath Gambhir in limited-overs cricket, lifting the ICC Champions Trophy and Asia Cup T20I version in unbeaten runs, similar can’t be mentioned about Check cricket as underneath him, India has gained simply seven Assessments and misplaced 10, drawing the opposite two. So far as the sequence report is worried: India began off nicely with a 2-0 sequence win in opposition to Bangladesh at dwelling, however back-to-back setbacks in opposition to New Zealand and Australia (1-3 Border-Gavaskar Trophy loss away from dwelling) result in legends Rohit, Virat, and Ravichandran Ashwin hanging up their whites.
The two-2 draw in opposition to England away from dwelling, in one of the vital gripping Check sequence through the years underneath management of a younger Shubman Gill, adopted by a 2-0 sequence win at dwelling in opposition to West Indies did instill hope, earlier than Proteas skipper Temba Bavuma, spinner Simon Harmer and tempo all-rounder Marco Jansen chipped in with a number of the greatest performances of the 12 months to first deny India a chase of merely 124 runs at Kolkata after which inflict on them their biggest-ever Check loss by 408 runs. In each the Assessments, India missed the providers of skipper Gill, who went down as a result of a neck harm sustained simply minutes into his batting stint on the Kolkata Check, with Rishabh Pant stepping in as captain.
However India did nicely sufficient to safe well-fought ODI and T20I sequence in opposition to Proteas by margins of 2-1 and 3-1 respectively, to make the house sequence a good affair total.
Now, India’s most important problem forward will not be Check cricket for some time, however defending their T20 World Cup crown, gained underneath Rohit Sharma’s captaincy final 12 months, with a new-look staff led by Suryakumar Yadav within the match beginning on February 7. India will begin off their marketing campaign in opposition to the USA on the identical day in Mumbai and have been positioned alongside Pakistan, Namibia, the Netherlands and the USA in Group A. Whereas the younger Indian staff has displayed a golden normal of T20I cricket for probably the most half this 12 months of their unbeaten run throughout all of the sequence, enjoying their first T20 World Cup within the absence of stalwarts Rohit and Virat for first time in a number of years in entrance of a house crowd can be an fascinating problem. (ANI)
