Surprised MSK Prasad Blasts Murali Vijay For 'Lack Of Communications' Remark Between Selectors And Players

Chairman of selectors MSK Prasad, on Thursday,  expressed his surprise after discarded senior India opener Murali Vijay stated about ‘lack of communication’ from the national selection committee.

Murali Vijay made the startling claims after being not included in the Test team for the ongoing series against West Indies. Vijay was dropped from the Test midway through the Test series in England. The opening batsman had made 20, 6, 0 and 0 in the first two Tests of India’s five-match series in England. He was not picked in the XI for the third Test and was dropped from the squad for the last two matches.

He, however, soon found his form while playing for Essex in the county championship. The right-handed batsman made scores of 56, 100, 85, 80 and 2. But those performances counted for little as the selectors ignored him. Vijay then spoke about a lack of communication between the selectors and dropped players. Just a few days before him, Karun Nair had also made the same claims.

Not surprisingly, the MSK Prasad-led committee is facing the heat. However, the former India wicketkeeper is in no mood to accept the accusations as he rubbished the claims.

“All these are baseless reports,” Prasad said

“With regard to the non-communication with Murali Vijay after dropping him, I am equally surprised why he has said this while my colleague and selector on call Devang Gandhi had clearly informed him about the reasons why he was dropped,” he added.

Prasad, on his part, also made it clear that Shikhar Dhawan could not make it to the squad because of his failures in Test cricket.

“Shikhar is a prolific run getter in white ball cricket which unfortunately he couldn’t replicate in red ball cricket. We have given him considerable opportunities before taking the decision on him in the longer format and give opportunity to the youngsters like Prithvi Shaw and Mayank Agarwal who were prolific run getters in domestic cricket and India A,” said Prasad.

Dhawan had a poor series in England. He, however, roared back to form in the recently-concluded Asia. The southpaw scored two centuries to finish as the highest run-getter as India lifted the trophy. However, the selectors decided to drop him and bring in Mayank Agarwal.

Meanwhile, a senior BCCI official also slammed Vijay for his claims while pointing out that it was the board which arranged for his county stint.

“It is very convenient that MSK has been made the whipping boy with some of these players not giving the correct picture. How did Vijay land a contract with Essex? Would he care to tell us? The arrangement was done by BCCI after speaking to national selectors,” the official said.

“Within a week of getting dropped, he was playing County cricket for Essex. He, in fact, missed early part of Vijay Hazare Trophy for county cricket. So didn’t Tamil Nadu Cricket Association know that he was playing county cricket. Vijay would do well not to speak about communication,” he added.