Former BCCI COA member Diana Edulji has criticized Indian skipper Virat Kohli for complaining about the team’s hectic schedule for their ongoing New Zealand tour. She pointed out that Kohli himself had approved the itinerary two years ago.
Speaking to reporters, skipper Kohli had criticised BCCI’s scheduling of the NZ tour. He said, “It’s getting closer and closer to landing at the stadium straight (from the airport). Hopefully, this will be taken into consideration in the future.” Many others had also condemned BCCI for not giving the players enough time to rest after the Australia series.
Talking to The Indian Express, Edulji said, “Virat complaining now is definitely strange, I feel that he is playing so much of cricket that he forgot that he has given OK for such a schedule. We didn’t force this on the players. They knew that they would be landing in New Zealand three days before. It’s written in the minutes. Only after they (players) gave their consent was it approved.”
Edulji was referring to the meeting held in 2017. Virat Kohli was a part of the group that had approved the Future Tour Programme (FTP) of the team till 2023, which also consisted of the ongoing New Zealand tour. Former skipper MS Dhoni and coach Ravi Shastri were also part of the group.
The minutes of that meeting, signed by former Comptroller and Auditor General of India Vinod Rai who headed the Committee of Administrators (CoA) at the time, states: “FTP (2019-2023). Mr Rahul Johri presented the proposal for International FTP. The Team Representatives [Kohli, Dhoni, and Shastri] appreciated the efforts of the BCCI team in addressing their concerns on the high number of playing days per season, long overseas tours and preparation time before a marquee series/event and gave their consent to the proposed FTP.”
Diana Edulji added that the FTP was passed only after everyone’s approval. She said, “We had asked if the players wanted to change anything. We passed the FTP only after the players and the coach okayed it.”
She further added, “We discussed how many T20s they are going to play, how many ODIs, how many home matches, the gaps between tournaments… We have always made sure that players got what they wanted, their comfort was top priority.”
India will play a five-match T20I series over 10 days. Then they will play three ODIs in seven days before the two-match Test series begins. They’ve already managed to bag the T20I series after winning the first three matches. The New Zealand tour began just two days after the ODI series against Australia came to an end.
In January itself India has played a whopping nine matches with three different countries. On Friday, they played their tenth match of the month.