Home and Away format finds favour in BCCI captains’ conclave
The concept of going back to the home and away format in Ranji Trophy games after one year's experiment with neutral venue format found favour from the majority of participants in the BCCI's captains-cum-coaches conclave here from Tuesday. "An overwhelming majority (of captains and coaches) wanted to go back to the home and away concept," said a Ranji Trophy skipper after the conclusion of the two-hour meeting that discussed "every aspect of BCCI tournaments", according to BCCI's acting secretary, Amitabh Chaudhry.
"There were views supporting both the formats. Instead of making a calculation of how many people were on which side, what was done was that points made to substantiate a certain position on either of the two formats have been collated," said Chaudhry. "They will be brought to the technical committee and then put before the general body which will take a call," he added. "The meeting lasted two hours and covered every aspect of the BCCI tournaments, particularly the Ranji Trophy. Even the Vijay Hazare (one-dayers) and Mushtaq Ali (T20s) were discussed. There was also a discussion on junior tournaments even though it was the Ranji captains and coaches conclave. Every tournament literally got covered," Chaudhry explained. "All aspects of the game, various tournaments, playing conditions and players' welfare - everything was discussed," he added.
It was learnt that the issue of raising the fees of domestic players too came up at the conclave as it was felt that the amount earned by players in Australia and England in domestic cricket was substantially higher and enough to make a living out of playing at this level too. Another issue that was discussed in detail was the quality of umpiring with almost everyone criticising the standards of officiating in domestic tournament, according to sources who attended the meeting. "Our umpires are very good in theory and are prompt in punishments but make a lot of mistakes on the field," was the opinion of one of the captains. There was also suggestion to revive the practise of rival captains giving their views through a report on umpiring after each game to the BCCI, which was discontinued last season, it was learnt. The meeting was attended by the BCCI's office bearers and the Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators whose member Ramchandra Guha described the discussions as "very educative."