Indian cricket's head coach hunting saga

Upendranath Bramhachari, an engineer with no cricketing background, is amongst those shortlisted for the post of the Indian cricket coach – news reports.
For the past couple of months, Indian cricket has been more or less in lockstep with the Indian Prime Minister in terms of grabbing the headlines in all our newspapers and television channels. The PM, of course, has hogged most of the limelight as he foxtrots his way around the globe, rubbing shoulders with world leaders, and the media keenly watching for every handshake, shoulder shrug and raised eyebrow to divine if those sweet nothings he and Trump, or Xi Jinping, or Theresa May or Angela Merkel were whispering into each other’s ears were of any significance, or were they merely saying, ‘Pass the salt, please’. As private conversations at the high table are never fully revealed, we will wait patiently for the PM’s public relations machine to give us the authorised, if sanitised, version.

Meanwhile, the Indian cricket team, both men and women, have been keeping us all in thrall. The men flattered to deceive in England, going down in the final of the Champions Trophy to a rookie Pakistan team in bewilderingly tame fashion, resulting in much wailing, gnashing of teeth and breast beating amongst the Indian multitudes. ‘Kohli is too arrogant’, ‘Dhoni is well past his sell by date’, ‘Somebody has been paid off to lose’. All because we lost one game, but it was the final, and it was against Pakistan. The TV news anchors were livid that they couldn’t stick their tongues out at their Pakistani counterparts, in addition to hurling their daily dose of abuse over the never ending Kashmir debates.

Thank God for the Indian cricket Eves. They have been winning most of their matches at the Women’s World Cup being played in England and, glory be to the father, the son and the holy ghost, they thrashed the living daylights out of the Pakistani ladies. Battle was truly joined and vengeance duly extracted for the shameful decline and fall of their more celebrated gentlemen counterparts. There’s more chatter right now in India about Smriti Mandhana and Mithali Raj than about Yuvraj Singh and Ajinkya Rahane.

However, the cricket talk has been all about who is going to be the new coach of the Indian cricket team, the men’s team that is, after the doughty Anil Kumble’s unfortunate exit in a cloud of controversy. It is interesting to note that while Ravi Shastri appears to be the bookie’s favourite, as well as Virat Kohli’s, the three wise mandarins of the Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC), under the aegis of the BCCI, will be sitting down to deliberate upon the merits of other candidates as well. In the capable hands of Sachin Tendulkar, Saurav Ganguly and V.V.S. Laxman rest the final decision and anointment. One learns, on good authority, that the following gentlemen have officially applied for the coveted and insanely handsomely paid job. Shastri may be a shoo-in, but he could also get the boot at the last minute. Stranger things have happened in the past in our cricketing corridors.

So here’s the list of applicants, according to BCCI, who have formally proferred their curriculum vitae. Ravi Shastri, Virender Sehwag, Dodda Ganesh, Lalchand Rajput (all from India), Tom Moody (Australia), Richard Pybus (England), Lance Kluesner (South Africa), Phil Simmons (West Indies), Rakesh Sharma (Oman), and Upendranath Bramhachari (engineer of no fixed abode and nil cricketing background).

Now here’s the thing. It’s all very well for us to keep bleating on about Shastri, Sehwag and Moody as being the front runners, with Shastri being more in front than the others. However, yours truly is absolutely riveted by the candidacy of this unknown Upendranath Bramhachari. Not only is he an unknown, he also openly professes a total lack of experience in matters cricketing. Tremendous! And he has actually been shortlisted. My personal take is that Shri Bramhachari is not telling us something, and hiding his light under a bushel. He could be the proverbial dark horse.

Unsurprisingly, when we carried out a sting operation under cover of darkness, we discovered amongst the musty files at the BCCI HQ, that there were two other candidates of equally dubious background, who had had the temerity to apply for the job of India’s national coach. Evidently, they were already rejected at the preliminary search stage. As their contact details were helpfully printed on their CVs, we were able to track them down, and ask each of them for a statement as to what made them apply, when they clearly did not know if LBW stood for “Leg Before Wicket” or “Love Before Wedding”.

Our first disqualified candidate was Trichy Singaravelan, a bus driver who plied his trade on the Chennai – Coimbatore - Bangalore  circuit. He learnt from the local Tamil dailies that the Indian cricket coach job was up for grabs, and the pay was good. ‘They are offering '6 crores per year Sir, for this job. Since BCCI is in financial trouble, they only got a few millions from the ICC and are looking to economise, I will offer my services for '6 lakhs only. Surely I will get the job, Sir’. Hmmm, undercutting Shastri and the others. Sound strategy.

Next we ferreted out Bankim Chandra Gangopadhyay, a practising priest at the famed Kalighat temple in Calcutta. He spoke to us chaste Bengali, which we have loosely translated. ‘You see, our players and cricket loving public are praying to God only when team is not playing well. As coach, I will introduce prayers from early morning both for players and for all the fans in India. One goat will be sacrificed every morning at the team hotel, and the mutton biryani will be Bhagwan’s prasad. We will win every, single match. Ask So-urav about me’. After that, there can be no argument, and we didn’t have the heart to tell him his application had already been rejected.  

We finally decided to check out the mysterious Upendranath Bramhachari, the engineer with zilch cricketing experience. On being quizzed as to how his name found its way into the BCCI shortlist along with all the reputed names, he was completely startled, ‘Cricket coach? I had applied for a junior engineer’s post at the Bhilai Cement Crushing Institute (BCCI). I think there has been some confusion.’

The spokesman at the BCCI, the cricket body that is, was unmoved. Mr. Bramhachari has been shortlisted, and that’s that. He has already spent two nights at The Taj, so he bloody well make a presentation – even if it’s on cement crushing’.

(The author is a brand consultant who loves music, cricket and good humour)