Chief selector MSK Prasad miffed by Murali Vijay’s 'lack of communication' claim

Vijay has expressed concern over the lack of communication between players and selection committee.

Murali Vijay was struggling for form during the Test series in England | Getty

BCCI’s chief selector MSK Prasad has expressed his surprise over Murali Vijay’s lack of communication claim between the selection committee and the players.

The selection panel led by Prasad came under the scanner after Karun Nair revealed that neither the team management nor the selectors communicated with him before being dropped from the 15-member Test squad for West Indies series.

Subsequently, Vijay echoed Nair’s statement and cited that he is concerned about the lack of communication between players and selectors.

“All these are baseless reports. With regard to the non-communication with Murali Vijay after dropping him, I am equally surprised why he has said this while my colleague and selector on call Devang Gandhi had clearly informed him about the reasons why he was dropped,” Prasad quoted as saying by PTI.

Vijay’s omission isn’t totally a surprise as he went without a fifty during three Tests in South Africa and two Tests in England this year. The right-hander recorded the scores of 20, 6, 0 and 0 against England before being dropped from the third Test.

Prasad also made it clear that Shikhar Dhawan was snubbed as he failed to replicate his white ball showing in the traditional format.

“Shikhar is a prolific run getter in white ball cricket which unfortunately he couldn’t replicate in red ball cricket. We have given him considerable opportunities before taking the decision on him in the longer format and give opportunity to the youngsters like Prithvi Shaw and Mayank Agarwal who were prolific run getters in domestic cricket and India A,” the chairman of selectors remarked.

Speaking to PTI, a senior BCCI official said that Vijay is probably not providing the Indian fans a clear picture of what has transpired.

“It is very convenient that MSK has been made the whipping boy with some of these players not giving the correct picture. How did Vijay land a contract with Essex? Would he care to tell us? The arrangement was done by BCCI after speaking to national selectors,” a BCCI official quoted.

“Within a week of getting dropped, he was playing County cricket for Essex. He, in fact, missed early part of Vijay Hazare Trophy as he was playing county cricket. So didn’t Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA) know that he was playing county cricket. Vijay would do well not to speak about communication,” he further added.

(With PTI inputs)

 
 

By Salman Anjum - 05 Oct, 2018

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