On Friday, Virender Sehwag revealed the reason why he missed out on becoming the Indian cricket team’s head coach. He feels that the lack of support from BCCI officials has resulted in his rejection and he will not apply for the position again.
Sehwag lost out to Ravi Shastri, who was lauded as the preference of skipper Virat Kohli despite that fact that former India captain Sourav Ganguly, a member of the Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC), was strongly against the decision.
In a recent interaction with India TV, Sehwag said, “Dekhiye main coach isliye nahi ban paaya kyonki jo bhi coach chun rahe the unse mera koi setting nahin tha. (Look I couldn’t become the (India) coach because I didn’t have any setting (common slang for hobnobbing with decision-makers) with those who were in power of appointing the coach).”
The swashbuckling opener also claimed that he was victimized by a section of the BCCI into applying for the post. He said, “I never thought of coaching the Indian cricket team. I was given an offer to coach the team. The BCCI (acting) secretary Amitabh Chaudhary and GM (Game Development) MV Sridhar came to me and requested me to think about the offer. I took my time and then applied for the position.”
In fact, Sehwag also revealed that he even had some words with Virat before applying.
“I also had a word with Virat Kohli, he asked me to go for it. It was only then that I applied. If you ask for my opinion, I would say that I was never interested. I thought since they are requesting me, I should help them. I never thought of applying on my own nor will I ever apply in future.”
Sehwag concluded by saying that earlier Shastri wasn’t willing to apply for the post, but he ditched. He said, “When I was in England during the Champions Trophy, I had asked Ravi Shastri that why he hasn’t applied for the post? Shastri then told me that he will not repeat the mistake which he had already made once. If Ravi had applied earlier, then I don’t think there would have been any chance of me applying for the post. I would have never applied.”
