Former India captain Kapil Dev has urged the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and Virat Kohli to put their differences aside and have a healthy conversation for the welfare of Indian cricket. Both the BCCI and Kohli haven't been on the same page after the latter was sacked as the captain of the ODI side in December 2021. The controversial revealed differences between Kohli and the board president Sourav Ganguly, which was a big talking point in Indian cricket recently. Kapil feels that the saga should come to an end by mutual consent and the board and player should have a conversation for the same.
"These days you do not get surprised by much. When he quit the T20I captaincy, one thought perhaps there was too much on his mind. From what we have read and heard, nobody wanted him to give up captaincy (then or now). He is a fantastic player; we should respect his decision," Kapil told The Week magazine.
"They should have sorted out the issues between them. Pick up the phone, talk to each other, put the country and team before yourself. In the beginning, I also got everything I wanted. But sometimes, you may not get it. That should not mean that you leave the captaincy. If he has left it because of that, then I do not know what to say. He is a fabulous player; (I want to) watch him play so much more and score runs, especially in Test cricket,” the 1983 World Cup winner asserted.
The captaincy saga is not new in Indian cricket as Kapil suffered from the same issue in his playing days, back in the 1980s. Kohli, recently relinquished his Test captaincy after the Indian team returned empty-handed losing the Test series 1-2.
The differences came to the fore when Kohli publicly criticised board president Ganguly, for not telling him of the sacking decision. The matter was further exaggerated when selector committee head Chetan Sharma said that Kohli was asked to not leave the T20I captaincy, supporting Ganguly.
The diminishing news had ill effects on the Indian team as they lost the ODI series 0-3. However, it was KL Rahul who led the side after Rohit Sharma was absent due to injury during the series loss. It was the Mumbai-based player who was named as the successor to Kohli in limited-overs format, while he also remains a firm favourite for the job in the red-ball format.
