Former Mumbai skipper Shishir Hattangadi, who quit as senior selector of the Mumbai Cricket Association on Tuesday, has clarified his stance on the issue.
Former Mumbai skipper Shishir Hattangadi, who quit as senior selector of the Mumbai Cricket Association on Tuesday, has clarified his stance on the issue.
Reacting to a report in these columns that he was miffed at the inclusion of veterans Amol Muzumdar and Vinayak Samant for Buchi Babu tournament in Chennai after the committee decided to stick to send an
inexperienced team, Hattangadi cleared the air through an email message to this paper. "The issue was not about veterans or individual names but a policy to look at young talent in order to create bench strength on the recommendation of the coach. So my being miffed has solely to do with a violation of the 'policy' and nothing to do with any individual player," he said yesterday.
However, in an e-mail sent to MCA joint secretary Hemant Waingankar u2013 a copy of which is with MiD DAY u2013 Hattangadi did express his displeasure over the inclusion of the two veterans and Gautam Yadav. He wrote: "Let me put it on record that the news of the above (Muzumdar and Yadav) inclusions, appeared in the press on Sunday the 9th of August. There were no telephonic calls made by you or the Chairman to inform/consult me on the above issue. Your 'note' also states you received a call from the Chairman Mr Shivalkar to include Mr Vinayak Samant on Monday the 10th of August."
An MCA insider had told MiD DAY that Hattangadi had aspirations of being chairman of selectors. This did not go down well with the former Mumbai captain. "From what I understand, my aspirations (as reported by you) and not being informed about team changes are two different issues," he shot back.
Yesterday, Waingankar confirmed that he received Hattangadi's resignation on Tuesday. "I have received it and will forward it to the Cricket Improvement Committee chairman Sunil Gavaskar whenever the CIC meets. The CIC will decide the future course of action," he said. Gavaskar took over as CIC head from Madhav Apte.
