13 September,2026 09:00 AM IST | Mumbai | Sunil Gavaskar
East’s Md Kounain Quraishi (right) and Anukul Roy during their 150-run stand on Day 5 of the Duleep Trophy final vs South on Thursday. Pic/PTI
Many congratulations to the East Zone team for winning the Duleep Trophy after a long gap. It's a good sign for Indian cricket to see a team with just one big name in batting and one big name in bowling lift the trophy. What it shows is that, if a team is well-led and combines well, then they can win matches and trophies.
The disappointing part was that East Zone did not go for an outright win and instead prolonged their second innings unnecessarily. That both skippers agreed to end the game earlier than scheduled also doesn't sit well. If the game was to be stopped early, then why wasn't it stopped at lunch time itself, when it was clear that in the two sessions remaining South Zone was never going to chase down a score more than 650 runs.
This business of the first innings lead being enough, is one of the main reasons India struggle to take 20 wickets on good pitches. How does a team learn to take 20 wickets if they don't bowl in two innings in a domestic game? India huffed and puffed on the last day of the second Test in Sri Lanka and couldn't take the last four wickets for a victory.
Just like it takes time for a batter to learn how to go from 20 and 30 to a half-century and from 70 and 80 to a century, so also understanding how to get 10 wickets in the second innings takes time. There's the question of stamina of course, for after four days of tense cricket, not just the physical but the mental stress also can be too much. And the one way to learn how to deal with that is at the first-class level. But, if a team that has taken a huge first innings lead is simply not interested in being on the field again, then how does one get the experience?
Way back when I was the Chairman of the BCCI Technical Committee, we took some radical decisions like doing away with the zonal system of Ranji Trophy and having an Elite and Plate tournament. This way, the players got the experience of playing in different parts of the country and in different weather conditions instead of just playing in their zones. The points system was also changed to simply one point for a first innings lead, two points for an outright win and no bonus points, which could be manipulated.
In order to qualify for the knockouts, teams had to look for outright wins and so even three-day games became interesting as teams played boldly to try and secure outright wins. Then, as it happens in Indian cricket, some vested interests came up with points for first innings lead and bonus points for âx' number of runs and wickets.
When teams started to prepare pitches to suit their strength, the BCCI initially looked to penalise them depending on the umpire's report but then the umpires realised that if they had ambitions of officiating at a higher level, then they couldn't upset the associations who were in power and report their sub-standard pitches.
There are, no longer, any committees in BCCI today apart from the selection committees and the CAC. Perhaps the time has come to expand the CAC and its brief of selecting the selectors and coach and also look at fixtures - domestic and international and all things related to Indian cricket. There are some incredibly experienced former cricketers whose expertise can be utilised to be on this committee. How about names like Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Sourav Ganguly, Ravi Shastri, Anil Kumble, Harbhajan Singh, Virender Sehwag - to name a few? The President and Secretary will be there too.
When this committee interacts with the coach and captain and the head of the NCA, it carries a heft beyond measure. A similar committee for women's cricket too, where experience and expertise meet to take calls to take Indian cricket forward.
Just thinking about this gives one the goosebumps. Will it ever happen or is it just a dream?
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