Dilip Vengsarkar says backing Virat Kohli ahead of Subramanium Badrinath in 2008 cost him chief selector's job

Former India captain Dilip Vengsarkar opened a can of beans by hinting that his term as chief selector of the BCCI’s national selection committee was cut short in 2008 owing to him favoring current Indian skipper Virat Kohli over Tamil Nadu batsman Subramaniam Badrinath.

The former national selector added that this decision of his did not go down too well with the then BCCI treasurer N Srinivasan.

Speaking at a function in Mumbai on Wednesday, Vengsarkar told journalists that his insistence that a teenaged Kohli - who had led India Under-19s to the junior World Cup in 2008 - be added to India’s ODI squad for the tour of Sri Lanka that year was what forced Srinivasan to end his tenure as chief selector. 

According to Vengsarkar, when the selection committee met to pick the Test and ODI squads for the Sri Lanka tour, he was very keen to hand Kohli a debut in the ODIs but that then captain MS Dhoni and coach Gary Kirsten were not convinced.

Vengsarkar, who played 116 Tests and 129 ODIs, took over from Kiran More as chief selector in 2006 and was replaced less than two years later by former team-mate Kris Srikkanth. It was Srinivasan’s influence, alluded Vengsarkar, that saw him lose his job and Srikkanth take over.