Virat Kohli vs BCCI: Former Pakistan skipper Shahid Afridi says cricket board should act like a ‘father’

Former Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi said that the Indian selection committee and Kohli should’ve discussed the matter before the news was made public.

Former Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi. (Source: Twitter)

Former Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi has now jumped into the long-running controversy between Team India Test captain Virat Kohli and the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). Kohli had spoken out against BCCI president Sourav Ganguly and how he was unceremoniously removed as the ODI captain recently.

Former Team India head coach Ravi Shastri has already said that the captaincy saga should have been handled better by the BCCI. Afridi, speaking to Pakistani news channel Samaa TV, said that the Indian selection committee and Kohli should’ve discussed the matter before the news was made public.

“This could have been handled in a better way. I always feel that the role of a cricket board is very important; it plays the role of a father. Whatever future plans a selection committee of a board has regarding a player, it communicates those plans to that player, like, ‘Look, we have these plans, what are your plans?’ We want to do this and as a board, we see benefits from doing this," he said.

Afridi feels communication between players and the board should take place face-to-face and not through media. When there’s a communication gap, problems like the one between Kohli and BCCI arise.

“If you communicate these things via media, there will be issues. Talk face-to-face, and we might have solutions. This won’t be solved if you keep dragging it. There should be no communication gap between players and PCB, or any board for that matter,” the former Pakistan all-rounder felt.

While Ganguly claimed that he had asked Kohli not to give up T20I captaincy, the latter said that his decision to relinquish the responsibility was received very well by the BCCI, and no one asked him to reconsider.