Veteran left-hander Gautam Gambhir was today formally retained as the captain of the Delhi Ranji Trophy team for the upcoming season.
The development was confirmed by convenor of the senior selection committee Sunil Dev, who is also the sports secretary, in a terse, one sentence media release stating Gambhir's appointment.
A source close to Gambhir said that despite the rumours of him not being comfortable with Ajay Jadeja's appointment as the coach, he would not have any problems to play under the former India player.
"Look, whether it is Jaddu (jadeja's nickname) or Dahiya, they won't teach Gautam how to bat. At the same time, he knows that he needs to concentrate on his game, if he harbours any remote chance whatsoever of an India comeback in near or distant future. So I don't think that it will be like Gautam won't play with Jaddu around. Coach's job is to conduct nets, Jadeja will do that," a senior DDCA official, known to be close to Gambhir told PTI today.
When chairman of senior selection committee Vinay Lamba was asked about the decision to appoint Gambhir as the skipper as Unmukt Chand's name was doing rounds, he termed it as an unanimous one.
"All of us, the three selectors (Lamba, Hari Gidwani and Rahul Sanghvi) were unanimous in our opinion that Gautam is the right man to lead the Delhi Ranji Trophy team. Accordingly, we took the decision and intimated it to the convenor (Dev)," Lamba, a former Delhi stalwart told PTI today.
He also informed that by September 23rd, they would like to announce the squad for the first match so that actual preparations will begin.
"We will definitely speak to Ajay (Jadeja) and seek his inputs also. We plan to select the squad by September 23rd. Among the senior players, Rajat (Bhatia) is playing league cricket in England and will be joining the camp by September 23rd," Lamba added.
Meanwhile the net sessions were again cancelled today as water seeped into the practice pitches despite being covered.
While Gambhir did not come as he knew that pitches were wet, the other probables did some physical training and running under coach Jadeja.
