Chandrakant Pandit named as new Mumbai coach

Mumbai: Former India stumper Chandrakant Pandit was on Tuesday chosen as the coach of the Mumbai Ranji Trophy team as well as the head coach of the Mumbai Cricket Association's indoor academy at the Bandra Kurla Complex.

The decision to appoint Pandit as coach and Milind Rege as the chairman of the senior selection panel was taken by MCA's Cricket Improvement Committee headed by former India skipper and MCA vice-president Dilip Vengsarkar.

Former Mumbai captain Rege would lead a four-member senior selection panel with former India left arm bowler Karsan Ghavri, former Mumbai left arm spinner Ravi Thaker and ex-batsman Nishit Shetty as its other members.

Ranjan Baindoor, Ramesh Vajge and Rajesh Sutar were named to head the Under-19, 16 and 14 age group selection committees while Trupti Bhattracharya was named to head the women's selection panel.

Vengsarkar later told reporters that the choice of Pandit, who has coached Mumbai in the past and whose term will be for two years, was a sound one. "Chandu has been around for a long time and under him we won a lot of titles. Pravin Amre did extremely well last season but wasn't keen to coach this season. Pandit is a proven guy, excellent strategist and good in management. He was the best choice we had," he said.

The names of Sulakshan Kulkarni, Sairaj Bahutule and Sameer Dighe were discussed before Pandit got the nod. MCA would also appoint a batting coach and bowling coaches - for fast bowlers and spinners.

"We have plans to take part in the Buchi Babu and KSCA tournaments. The Under-23 is a very important age group. We have also decided to pick 20 players in the Under- 12 age group and groom them so that they will be available for the Under-14 level," Vengsarkar said.

On Tuesday three members - Sanjay Manjrekar, Ajit Agarkar and Amol Muzumdar – could not attend, but Vengsarkar said he had talked to them ahead of the CIC meeting.