The 10.04 pm press release

The BCCI ought to have organised a press conference for chief selector Ajit Agarkar to explain his committee’s decisions ahead of the Australia tour instead of the team being announced via email

It’s the biggest Test series of the next 12 months. It involves the only Indian side going to Australia as winners of the last two series there (only England and the West Indies have done so). It’s also the first five-match India vs Australia Test rubber since 1991-92. And apart from the fortunate ones who have managed tickets, innumerable fans will be glued to their television sets/phones to keep abreast of what’s happening in the 2024-25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy.

But how does the BCCI promote the series? To be more precise, how does BCCI release its team, picked by Ajit Agarkar’s selection committee, to journalists? Through an email which arrives in inboxes on Friday at 10.04 pm, a time when most newsrooms are in the final stages of their respective editions. But then, why would the BCCI be expected to think about editions closing and the time of their release that incidentally, thwarts any plans of giving the selection news a big display, justifying its big-ticket status?

Did the squad announcement occupy the first part of the press release? No. First came the list of players picked to figure in the four-match T20 series in South Africa.

Sure, that limited overs series begins two weeks before the Test contest in Australia, but no prizes for guessing which of the two events is the more critical one. Hence, shouldn’t the Australia Test tour selection have been mentioned first. 

Nit-picking? Probably.

The big question to some of us journalists was why wasn’t a press conference with the chairman of selectors not held especially when the selection took place during a Test match? The media conference could have been held either after the regular day’s media briefing or the next day. 

By the way, bowling coach Morne Morkel addressed the media in Pune on a day when India’s batting fell to pieces; dismissed for 156 in 45.3 overs. This went on to coincide with selection day.

“I never like to have a punch up between batters and bowlers but, in Test match cricket, you need to score the first innings runs. If we put our hand up, we haven’t been able to do that. There are world-class players in our batting line-up. I know that individually, they’ve got their processes and they know how to go about those things.

“Hopefully, we can iron those mistakes out because it’s costing us at the moment—not getting the runs on the board—but I’m pretty sure there’s enough experience, enough knowledge amongst them to rectify that,” said Morkel. The South African was candid, but ideally a senior member of the batting group fronting up to the media would have been ideal.

There were several questions to be asked of the Australia tour selection and it’s not that Agarkar has been made to face the media so often that he is tired of doing so.

Chairmen in earlier years have faced the media so why are the current selectors so regularly kept away from the members of the fourth estate? Yes, there have been times when the media has been unreasonable in their line of questioning. The media manager present at the briefing can arrest the problem and Agarkar is smart, suave and strong enough to handle unreasonable questions. 

The media would have liked to know what exactly came in the way of Mohammed Shami making it in the tour party this time after he was part of the last two Border-Gavaskar Trophy series Down Under. Ankle-troubled Shami had said he was pain-free recently. Press conferences need not be about exclusions alone. A few words from the chief selector on Abhimanyu Easwaran, Akash Deep, Prasidh Krishna, Harshit Rana and Nitesh Kumar Reddy would been handy. Also, if Kuldeep Yadav who has been sent to the BCCI Centre of Excellence for a, as per the BCCI release, “long term resolution of his chronic left groin issue”, then what was he doing in the squad in Pune? 

Jay Shah has been credited for making some significant changes in Indian cricket since he took over as Secretary, and rightly so. Whether he will be moved to raise the level of interaction with the media is to be seen.

Meanwhile, this Australian tour selection reminded me of the time when the Indian team for the 1999-2000 tour of Australia was picked.  Like then, the team was picked during a home series against New Zealand. The present chairman of selectors, Ajit Agarkar, was at the centre of a storm between two powerful men—then BCCI secretary JY Lele and coach Kapil Dev. The Board wanted Agarkar to play a Times Shield game for Mumbai-based national selector Anil Deshpande to see how match fit he was, to be picked for the tour of Australia. But Kapil wanted Agarkar to be part of the squad in the third Test at Ahmedabad. When Lele discovered that Agarkar had been summoned by the coach, he was livid. Ultimately, Agarkar was picked in the squad. As expected, there was a lot of chatter about who would be on the plane to Australia, and who wouldn’t. Pressmen and the players-turned-commentators indulged in talk about the possible team and I remember one prominent commentator being impressed with the late Kolkata-based journalist Partha Rudra for getting the entire team right in his selection preview. This was days before Lele’s “India will lose 3-0” conversation with ex-BCCI president PM Rungta in Delhi, was leaked. Those were different days. Journalists went to selection press conferences, asked tough questions, some got carried away too but the job was done. Unlike now, they don’t have to wait for 10.04 pm to be delivered the news of the team.

mid-day’s group sports editor Clayton Murzello is a purist with an open stance. He tweets @ClaytonMurzello 
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The views expressed in this column are the individual’s and don’t represent those of the paper.

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