Virat Kohli had offered to resign from the post of captain of Indian cricket team had Anil Kumble would not have left the post on his own after the end of his contract as the Head Coach of Indian cricket team, a report in The Telegraph reveals,
“Kohli had been adamant that Kumble couldn’t continue as the head coach and that the Board needed to look for a replacement…. That, it seems, was communicated to the Committee of Administrators’ chief Vinod Rai, besides top officials of the Board and, of course, the CAC…. Had the Board gone ahead and implemented Sachin, Sourav and Laxman’s recommendation, then Kohli would almost surely have resigned,” a source told The Telegraph.
The news of a rift between the two have been in public domain from past one month but no one had any idea about such a thing as, on daily basis, new secrets are being revealed in this saga. One report suggests that ten of the Indian players were unhappy with working of Kumble whereas another report suggests that Kumble was overbearing. In the latest progress, it is learned that Kohli wanted Kumble to be removed at any cost and he was even ready to give up his captaincy for this.
Now with this news coming out, the seriousness of the matter can be understood. Surely, both the players are legends of the game but it a fact that there can’t be two strong voices in the dressing room and differences are bound to happen. It is clear that both of them have failed to sort out the issue and with the sacking of BCCI President Anurag Thakur at the start of the year, there was no one to call up both of them to have a word with each other.
It has been learned that both had already stopped communicating six months ago and even did not want to share space with each other, an example of which was seen when Virat Kohli left net session during the Champions Trophy as soon as Kumble arrived there to test a new equipment.
Kumble has resigned from the post just a day after his contract ended, even when he was given an extension by BCCI to be with the Indian team for the tour to West Indies. Kumble, in his statement, has accepted that he had differences with Kohli and their relationship was untenable.
Now the ball is in BCCI’s court and it’s their turn to get the matter sorted, even if they appoint someone else for the job.