BCCI leaves players stranded

JAMSHEDPUR, March 12: For once, it was not the usual elaborate attempt at secrecy that prevented the India A' team from announcing its fina...

JAMSHEDPUR, March 12: For once, it was not the usual elaborate attempt at secrecy that prevented the India A8217; team from announcing its final XI the evening before the three-day match against Australia. It was just that by this afternoon only eight players had marked their attendance at the Keenan Stadium. Skipper Vikram Rathore was understandably a puzzled man, the organisers were tense and an embarrassing situation seemed to be brewing here.

The immediate explanation was that there was a train derailment on the Calcutta-Jamshedpur sector. But even as the last pair of Madhya Pradesh batsman Amay Khurasia and Baroda batsman Jacob Martin trooped in by late evening, it was clear that there was more to the story than the derailment angle.

Apparently, the Board of Control for Cricket in India BCCI had informed the players that they need to report here only by March 12. Most of the players took the BCCI advice at face value and nearly paid the price for it.

But a wiser few like Venkatesh Prasad, VikramRathore and the Delhi trio of Nikhil Chopra, Vijay Dahiya and Rahul Sanghvi reached here yesterday itself.

As a result, there were only four players at practice this morning, while unexpected rains in the afternoon ensured that the rest who arrived later were stuck out on a limb.

The BCCI progress report on this issue runs like this. The Jamshedpur match is fixed more than a month back. The team is announced just four days ago. The players are asked to report only a day before the match. Some of them don8217;t even get an official intimation of their selection. They have to rely solely on newspaper reports and manage train tickets during a busy festive week to this out-of-the-way cricket outpost.

Finally, this collection of cricketers from all over the country are asked to play together as a team against a side like Australia without even a minute8217;s practice together.

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As a player commented wryly, the BCCI could not be blamed as they were too busy arranging a chartered plane for the Australians.