BCCI Gave Ajit Agarkar Free Hand After Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli's Test Retirement: Report

Ajit Agarkar's tenure as the selection committee chief of the men's national team has come to an end, but there's a lot that seems to have happened behind-the-scenes before his exit was formalised. While many speculations are going around on social media, a report has claimed that Agarkar was given a free hand by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to overhaul the national team after veterans Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma retired from Test cricket. But, in the middle of this process, a few things seem to have gone wrong.

Agarkar was in charge of the national selection committee during a tough period that saw Gautam Gambhir replace Rahul Dravid as the head coach, while Kohli and Rohit quit Tests and T20I formats.

It has been reported by The Telegraph, BCCI gave Agarkar the license to make some bold calls in the team, including the Test retirements of Rohit and Kohli. While Agarkar said that it was their own personal call, he himself was in charge of the selection committee that dropped T20 World Cup-winning skipper Suryakumar Yadav from the T20I team.

What Led To Agarkar's Exit?

Agarkar was expected to pen a one-year contract extension and remain in charge till the ODI World Cup next year. However, the plans took a U-turn and an extension went out of picture. According to a report in PTI, when BCCI officially "issued" a statement backing Rohit and dismissing talks of his retirement post Lord's, he was left slighted and angry.

"That was perhaps the day when Ajit knew that it would be very difficult for him to continue. In fact, he had no inkling that a media statement was issued by the BCCI. He understood that going forward, the call on big names won't be his prerogative," a senior BCCI official privy to development told PTI on conditions of anonymity.

Those who know Agarkar closely would vouch that when it comes to cricketing decisions, just like head coach Gautam Gambhir, it comes from a place of honesty even though some work and some don't.

The BCCI wanted him to go slow on Rohit's future while he felt that if Yashasvi Jaiswal had to play the ODI World Cup, he has to be given around 20 ODIs to settle down.

The argument in favour of Rohit was that he was scoring in every third ODI which cannot be considered bad while for Agarkar, he perhaps felt that there are no guarantees that the ageing 'Hit-Man' would be effective in the Rainbow Nation.

The fact that Agarkar possibly could never accept was that when it comes to megastars in Indian cricket -- retirement or continuation, hardly ever has that been a call of selection committee. It has and will always remain an administrative call -- give it or take it.

With PTI Inputs

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