When the team for India's South Africa tour was named, it was announced that Rohit Sharma will be the new ODI captain.
The move seemed logical, considering India's four-year ICC title drought under Kohli, but created a controversy thanks to the manner in which the decision was made and communicated.
Kohli said, “I was told I will not be ODI captain one-and-a-half-hours before the selection committee meeting and I was ‘okay, fine’.”
This gave an indication that there were no proper talks, contrary to the claims of BCCI president Sourav Ganguly.
Ganguly had earlier said that he got in touch with Kohli about the T20I and ODI captaincy and asked the latter to reconsider the move of stepping down from the leadership role.
“I wasn’t told to reconsider it. (When I approached the BCCI and told them my decision) it was received well...,” Kohli said.
Ganguly responded to it by saying, "No statements, no press conference. We will deal with it, leave it to (the) BCCI."
It's not the first time that the BCCI are messing things up. Ganguly and Dravid themselves endured it as players 16 years ago.
Let us revisit similar episodes that created ripples in Indian cricketing circles in the last 24 years.
When Master Blaster came to know about his sacking from media
In 1996, after the shock World Cup semifinal defeat against Sri Lanka at home and a mediocre England tour, which also saw Navjot Singh Sidhu walking out due to a tiff with Mohammed Azharuddin, the latter was sacked as captain and the reins were handed over to the 23-year-old Sachin Tendulkar.
The Master Blaster started his captaincy career with a bang, winning the Test series' against Australia and South Africa at home. India then toured South Africa and the West Indies between December 1996 and April 1997.
Out of the eight Tests played there, India lost three and drew the remaining five. To add to the misery, India lost the one-match ODI series against Zimbabwe in February 1997, apart from losing the final of the Standard Bank trination tournament at the Rainbow Nation. In the Carribbean too, the four-match series saw a comprehensive 3-1 victory for the Windies.
The above results forced BCCI to hand the captaincy back to Azhar.
However, the way Sachin came to know about his sacking was odd in every sense.
The Master Blaster went on to reveal later that no one from the board informed him about the decision and he came to know about the development only from the media.
“At the end of the series, I was unceremoniously sacked as skipper. No one from the BCCI managed to call me or inform me of my removal as captain before someone from the media called to say I was no longer captain," was how Tendulkar explained the incident in his autobiography.
He replied with his bat, scoring 12 hundreds in the 1998 season, hammering Australia (especially Shane Warne) at home in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy and then at Sharjah (two consecutive hundreds, including a match-winning 143 at the final), followed by another masterly knock of 141 at ICC 1998 quarterfinal at Dhaka against the same opposition, which took India to the semis.
The leaked email that started the Ganguly vs Greg Chapell saga
Greg Chappell became India coach in 2005 and his first assignment was the Indian Oil Cup in Sri Lanka, where the visitors lost the final. Despite Ganguly's presence, Rahul Dravid donned the captain's hat as the 'Prince of Kolkata' joined the team in the middle of the tournament after serving a four-match ban.
The fallout between Ganguly and Chappell began during the following Zimbabwe tour, where the skipper was asked to step down from captaincy. Chappell even said ahead of the first Test that both Yuvraj Singh and Mohammad Kaif should be picked at Dada's expense, after which Ganguly decided to leave the tour, only to be pacified by the team management.
After India won the series 2-0 and Ganguly scored a hundred at the first game, things took an ugly turn.
He accused the team management of forcing him to leave the captaincy. Days later, Chappell read out a statement before the second Test, saying he indulged in a private chat with Sourav to motivate the later for the Bulawayo game and he also shares a "strong mutual respect with Ganguly going back a long time". Tendulkar, however, said that the dressing room talks should remain private.
Chappell then emailed BCCI about Ganguly being "mentally and physically unfit, harbouring a negative attitude" as a leader, which can hamper India's 2007 World Cup chances. He also accused Dada of desperately trying to retain the captaincy despite losing trust and respect within the team. The email got leaked and BCCI called the duo for a meeting in Mumbai where they reportedly decided to work together.
However, Ganguly got dropped for Sri Lanka and South Africa ODIs at home. He was selected only for the home Tests against Lankans and the subsequent Pakistan tour, as Dravid became the new captain.
Off spinner Harbhajan Singh accussed Chappell of creating an environment of fear and insecurity within Team India, which resulted a gag order being issued by the management. After the 0-1 loss against Pakistan in Tests, Ganguly was out of the team for almost a year.
As Chappell kept on tinkering, his overbearing personality found no support from the seniors. Media started calling Team India as Team Chappell.
While Ganguly continued to slog it out in the domestic circuit, India suffered a 1-4 defeat in the ODIs during the Windies tour, faced group stage eliminations at DLF Cup in Malaysia (involving Australia and West Indies) and ICC Champions Trophy at home.
Team Chappell's 0-4 ODI humiliation during the 2006 South Africa tour forced the selectors to recall Ganguly to the Test side.
Although India lost the series by 1-2 (after registering their maiden Test victory at the Rainbow Nation), Dada, with his new middle-stump guard, became India's highest scorer (214 runs in three games). He came back into the ODI fold too in 2007 and scored 1106 Test and 1240 ODI runs at an averages of 61.44 and 44.28 respectively that year.
A group stage exit at the 50-over World Cup ended Chappell's below-par stint and a scarred BCCI kept itself aloof from the idea of hiring another foreign professional. Chandu Borde, Lalchand Rajput, Ravi Shastri, Venkatesh Prasad and Robin Singh managed Team India till Garry Kirsten's arrival in 2008.
Virat Kohli vs Anil Kumble and another email leak
On June 24, 2016, BCCI appointed Anil Kumble as head coach, replacing Ravi Shastri, who was in-charge of the senior men's team since 2015 World Cup.
The legendary leg-spinner and former India Test skipper is known as a hard taskmaster in coaching circles. Within months of Kumble's appointment, his combination with skipper Virat Kohli, engineered a massive turnaround in Team India's fortunes at Test cricket.
India played 17 Test matches in 2016/17 calender, won 12 out of them and got back their number one position in ICC rankings after five years.
However, then came June 18, 2017, when Kohli and co were demolished by 180 runs in the Champions Trophy final against Pakistan in the UK.
Despite Vinod Rai, the chief of the Supreme Court-appointed Committee Of Administrators (COA), saying on June 12 that Kumble will continue till the West Indies tour, the India veteran put down his papers on June 20, barely 48 hours after the humiliating loss to Pakistan.
While on his Twitter statement, he congratulated and thanked the team management, BCCI and the players, a glaring few lines caught the media attention.
"Post this intimation, I was informed for the first time yesterday by the BCCI that the Captain had reservations with my 'style' and about my continuing as the Head Coach. I was surprised since I have always respected the role boundaries between Captain and Coach. Though the BCCI attempted to resolve the misunderstandings between the Captain and me, it was apparent that the partnership was untenable, and I therefore believe it is best for me to move on. Professionalism, discipline, commitment, honesty, complementary skills and diverse views are the key traits I bring to the table. These need to be valued for the partnership to be effective. I see the Coach's role akin to 'holding a mirror' to drive self-improvement in the team's interest. In light of these 'reservations' I believe it is best I hand over this responsibility to whomever the CAC and BCCI deem fit."
In December, 2018, when the Indian cricket circle was rife with talks about personality clashes between women's team skipper Mithali Raj and coach Ramesh Powar, another email leak happened, similar to the Chappell vs Ganguly episode.
This time news agency AFP accessed the mail (written by Diana Edulji to Vinod Rai) and this was what stated there: "Kohli frequently sent SMSs to the CEO on which you acted and there was a change in the coach."
This was a damning proof that Kohli indeed worked behind Kumble's back and had a major role to play in latter's removal.
ALSO WATCH |