The veteran coach, Gary Kirsten’s decision to apply for the role of the next India women’s team coach has taken his Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) completely by surprise. Kirsten was appointed as the head coach by RCB in August. However, his move to apply for the women’s coaching position role just days before the IPL auction on December 18 in Jaipur comes at a very inopportune moment for the Virat Kohli-led franchise.
As per the reports inCricketNext, one of the RCB officials said, “Gary has not reached out to us or mentioned anything about applying for any other position. Unless the BCCI informs us officially that Kirsten will be taking up a post with them, he remains the head coach of our team. We’ll take a call on the situation if Gary informs us otherwise.”
The application process ended on Friday and Kirsten is now the most high-profile applicant from a list of candidates that includes former cricketers like Atul Bedade, David Johnson & Manoj Prabhakar besides others such Owais Shah, Herschelle Gibbs & Dimitri Mascarenhas besides outgoing coach Ramesh Powar. Former Pakistan and Sri Lanka head coach Dav Whatmore is also in the running.
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On the other hand, the BCCI confirmed that Kirsten is one among many applications received by the board at the end of the day on December 14.
Talking about the same, a senior BCCI official said, “He is one of the applicants but we are still in the process of short-listing candidates to call for an interview on December 20. If they fulfill all the criterion, only then they will be on shortlist for the interview that will be forwarded to the ad-hoc committee.”
An ad-hoc committee which features Kapil Dev, Anshuman Gaekwad and Shantha Rangaswamy will be conducting interviews for the candidates. However, Kirsten’s application has led to some curiosity considering his IPL commitments.
The committee said, “There is no doubt about Kirsten’s credentials as a coach. But isn’t he still coaching an IPL franchise? We have to find out how he will be able to take up this job if he continues to hold the post with RCB.”
ALSO READ: Gary Kirsten Becomes The New Coach Of RCB
Meanwhile, Gopal Sankaranarayanan, secretary of the Lodha Panel which led to the Supreme Court appointing the Committee of Administrators (CoA) in charge of running the BCCI felt that although there is no conflict of interest in Kirsten taking up two jobs, it is not a situation that should not be permitted.
Sankaranarayanan said, “I don’t see any reason for conflict of interest in this issue but rather it will have to be a compromise. If it was (Ravi) Shastri requesting time off to do IPL coaching, then there might have been a conflict because he could have favoured a player from his franchise in the Indian team. This is not the case with the women’s job. However, women’s coach job is a full-time job. I don’t know if BCCI will offer him that option or flexibility in their contract but in my opinion, Gary should not be holding two jobs, especially since one is a full-time women’s coach job.”
