Wait For India Women’s Cricket Team Head Coach Continues

The wait to have a head coach for the India women’s cricket team continues as the Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC) has now made a suggestion to have interviews for fielding and bowling coaches.

“CAC have already done one round of interviews and they feel there is need of fielding and bowling coach. So that process will happen before the announcement is made,” BCCI secretary Jay Shah said after meeting staging state associations of World Cup in New Delhi.

Amol Muzumdar is a front-runner to be part of the backroom set-up in some capacity but there has been no official word from the Indian cricket board yet.

The team has been without a head coach after Ramesh Powar was shifted to the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in December last year. Powar had two stints with the Indian team and was given the charge as the head coach in May 2021 for the second time.

India had a forgettable run during the ODI World Cup in 2022 but returned with a silver medal in the Commonwealth Games under him.

After Powar, batting coach Hrishikesh Kanitkar was handed over the interim charge and his immediate assignments included the five-match series against Australia at home in December 2022, tri-series in South Africa, also involving West Indies, in January-February 2023 and the T20 World Cup 2023 in South Africa. Australia’s Troy Cooley was named the bowling coach.

The Women in Blue lost the bilateral tie against Australia, suffered a defeat in the final of the tri-series against South Africa and then bowed out of the T20 World Cup after losing to Australia in the semi-final.

After the conclusion of the T20 World Cup, India’s next trip was to Bangladesh where Nooshin Al Khadeer was named the interim coach for the tour. The Harmanpreet Kaur-led side won the three-match T20I series 2-1 while the three-match ODI series ended in a 1-1 draw.

The series will be long remembered for Kaur’s onfield outburst during the third ODI and the theatrics at the post-match presentation. The Indian skipper was slapped a two-match ban by the International Cricket Council (ICC) recently and will miss India’s first two games of Asian Games. Shah said the BCCI president Roger Binny and NCA head VVS Laxman will speak to the star Indian batter on the outburst.

“We will have our President Roger Binny and VVS Laxman speak to her (regarding the outburst). The ICC has already banned her and the time to appeal against the decision has already passed,” said Shah.

South Africa will play India next in September 2023 as the two sides will lock horns in three ODIs and as many T20Is. The board will be expected to make the announcement before that.