New Delhi, Oct 12 — Former India cricketer and ex-chief selector Sandeep Patil has stated that iconic cricketers like Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh, Gautam Gambhir, and Zaheer Khan ‘know the reasons' why they were phased out of the national side, adding that his selection committee had to put the future of Indian cricket ahead of personal relationships.
Patil, a member of India’s 1983 ODI World Cup-winning team, headed the five-member senior men’s selection committee during a critical transition phase from 2012 to 2016.
“First of all, I want to make it clear: I wasn’t the only one making these decisions. There was a selection panel of five, and I was its chairman.
“Whatever decisions we made, we made with the future of Indian cricket in mind. It feels very bad to bring this up today, but legends as great as Sachin Tendulkar, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh, and Zaheer Khan had to leave the team or retire. They know the reasons.
“Our job as selectors was to put the interests of the country, the BCCI, and Indian cricket first,” Patil, currently the mentor of Mumbai’s senior and age-group men’s teams, said in an appearance on 'The Great Indian Cricket Show' on Doordarshan.
The tenure of Patil’s committee coincided with a major overhaul following the 2011 Men’s ODI World Cup triumph, as several veteran stalwarts made way for younger talent across formats.
Patil, who was the former head of the National Cricket Academy (NCA), now known as the BCCI Centre of Excellence (CoE), further said about the professional boundaries selectors must maintain with players as they had to take decisions that impacted long-term friendships.
“You can be friends with players, but there has to be a line. You can’t say, ‘He is my friend, so I will pick him for the team.’ When you are given this responsibility, you have to take it seriously.
“You are not thinking about your own cricket; you are thinking about India’s cricket and its future. You sometimes have to make decisions you are not happy with, but you make them for the good of the Indian team,” he added.