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DEAR REDIFF

Lele with his foot in his mouth...

Prem Panicker

Sometimes, you read something. Then sit back, blinking, wondering if you read it right.

The latest statement by BCCI secretary J Y Lele belongs to that category. Without frills, this is what he said: "I see no reason to give the captain and coach any more powers in matters pertaining to team selection."

In Calcutta to attend a working committee meeting of the BCCI, Lele did not stop with that, but went on to elaborate. "In no other Test playing countries do captains enjoy more powers," says Lele.

A fallacy right there - in the West Indies to cite one example, both captain and coach are full voting members of the selection committee. In Pakistan, again, captain and coach are full voting members (and while on Pakistan, it might interest Lele to know that a certain Imran Khan, in his time, made the entire selection committee into a rubber stamp, handing over a list of the side as he wanted it and taking the approval for granted - Lele might like to check out Pakistan's record under Khan's captaincy, while he is about it. And compare it with India's, under the structure he so obviously favours).

In South Africa, the captain short-lists the players he wants - and only when he wants to go outside the playing squad does he leave it open to the selection committee to suggest suitable young talent from the domestic circuit. In England, the same situation prevails. And so on, and so forth... Obviously, Lele's knowledge of the structure prevailing abroad is, shall we say, a shade less than complete?

Does that sound too harsh? Okay, Lele's next statement reads as follows: "For example, the captains of the Sri Lankan and Australian teams do not have a vote in selecting the sides".

About Sri Lanka, I will get to in a while. However, we can dismiss the other one in an instant - by merely pointing out that the fact is that Mark Taylor is very much a member of the Australian selection committee, with full voting powers. Unless Lele went and changed the Australian system without bothering to inform the ACB about it.

Back to Lele, who says, with refreshing candour: "Of course, due weightage is given to the captain's preferences while selecting sides, all over the world." What the honourable secretary conveniently forgot to add, of course, is the codicil: 'Except in India, where the captain's suggestions are not only ignored, but he is even asked to 'shut up' in the midst of a selection committee meeting'.

But wait, there is more wisdom coming from Lele. "In our country," says he, "the captain hardly has time to play most of the domestic tournaments because of busy schedule, so how would he know the upcoming players, who is good and who is bad?"

Very, very clever debating point, here. Again, what Lele forgets is that it can be turned around on its head. Thus: the captain is in the best position to know who performs well, and who performs badly, on a tour. Also to judge the attitude of the players concerned. So how then does it come about that the captain, for instance, says at the end of the West Indies tour that Dodda Ganesh is a much improved bowler and a good prospect for the future - and the selectors promptly drop him not just from the side, but from the list of 27 probables? Ditto Sunil Joshi? How does it come about that the captain, having observed V V S Laxman at close quarters, asks for him to be picked as an opener and the selectors say no, we can give you Gagan Khoda instead?

All of Lele's statements, thus far, are merely working around to the central point of his argument. Which is: "I see no necessity for changing the present format of the selection committee, since I see no merit in the view that the committee should consist only of players who have played Test cricket!"

So there we have it, the reason for this diatribe. The BCCI is now actively considering a proposal to do away with the five member selection committee by end September, and to put in its place a three-member committee comprising former Test greats. In fact, Sunil Gavaskar, Ravi Shastri and Dilip Vengsarkar have all been approached with feelers, to test their readiness to form part of such a committee. Given this situation, Lele is very obviously launching a pre-emptive strike, here, to try and preserve the status quo.

The trouble with doing that, however, is that Lele just does not have the stature, cricketing or administrative, to pull it off. And, very apparently, neither does he have sufficient knowledge to be able to cite examples to buttress his arguments, such as they are.

And his last statement, supporting his claim that selectors do not need to have experience, is the silliest of them all. Quote: "In Sri Lanka, they have a seven member selection committee and all of them have not played Test cricket."

Very impressive. Part of the old dictum that if you say something vehemently enough, it becomes truth. However, to his bad luck, no less than Arjuna Ranatunga recently gave an indepth interview to Sportstar magazine, of which one question and Ranatunga's answer are relevant here. Quoting:

Question: How much support do you get from the players and the administrators?

Answer: More than 100 per cent. It is very easy in our system. Before I go to the team selection, I chat with Aravinda. He is like a brother to me. We discuss a few things. Then I speak to past players, senior cricketers, and then go to the selection committee. The selectors too have backed me a lot. Luckily, we have some very good selectors. I still feel we should have had Ranjan Madugalle in the committee. He was very forthcoming and very receptive of ideas and very intelligent. Our selectors are experienced, and most of them have played with me (emphasis ours) and that helps a lot.

So much for that.

So, in sum, what do we have here? Lele makes two statements of fact - that in no other Test playing committee does the captain enjoy more power; and that the Lankan committee consists of persons without top class experience. Both are totally false.

And in peddling off those two false statements, Lele proves two things. One, that he takes the media, and the followers of the game, for fools, considers them totally ignorant of what is going on in the cricketing world. And two, he in the process reveals that, despite being the most visible symbol of cricket authority in the country - BCCI president Raj Singh Dungarpur has, since taking over, been neither seen or heard; a childlike virtue that - has not even bothered to study cricket administration elsewhere in the world.

He also makes two statements of intention - one, that he has no mind to give the captain and coach powers in team selection, and two, that he has no intention of going along with the demand for a change in the system.

The damage this mindset can - will - cause to the game in this country is best left to the reader to judge.

Tailpiece: Considering how careless of fact Lele is, he actually goes out of his way, at the end of his diatribe, of accusing the media of similar carelessness. Thus, he says there is no truth to reports in the media that Madan Lal will be deposed before the end of his term.

Interesting, that, for two reasons. One - the media said that after Madan Lal's ill-timed interview to the Hindu in which he publicly criticised the players he is in charge of, he will not be considered for an extension of tenure. And that remains true - Madan Lal's tenure ends in September, therefore the Toronto odyssey against Pakistan will be his last outing.

More interestingly, Madan Lal's successor has already been picked. A certain Anshuman Gaikwad. And it was a certain J Y Lele, no less, who sent Gaikwad to Sri Lanka, even while the incumbent coach remains in situ, so that he could familiarise himself with the team ahead of taking up his assignment.

There's an old phrase that seems peculiarly apposite, here: Who died and made Lele god?