The Kumble - Kohli Combination Is Ready To Face All Challenges

Players have been asked to prove their fitness, form and match preparedness by playing in domestic tournaments...

- Sunil Garodia

In June this year, the BCCI put out an advertisement for a head coach for the Indian cricket team. While 57 applications were received, in the end the choice boiled down to the high profile former Team Director Ravi Shastri and former Team India captain and one of India’s most successful bowlers, Anil Kumble. Kumble’s name was not included in the shortlist of 21 candidates that the BCCI had in mind. He was added at the insistence of the Cricket Advisory Committee, made up of three ex- India stalwarts in Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman, who were tasked with selecting the man to coach the Men in Blue for the next one year. Despite not having any coaching experience, Kumble was finally selected for his overall stature and the fact that he was mentor for IPL teams for two years. The fact that he was the captain of the Indian team in the recent past and had retired not too many years ago must have also weighed in with the three wise men.