Is Kirsten ready for Boxing Day Test?

Nov 28:  If former South African batsman agrees to become the coach of India, it will be his debut as a full-fledged international coach at the Melbourne ground from where he started his Test career in the year 1993.

Former South African batsman is all set to make his full-fledged international coaching career a kick start with the Indian team but the big question that is still looming large, will he be able to join the Team India from the Boxing Day Test at Melbourne?

According to the information the South African has been given a week time to accept the offer given by BCCI. At the moment the prolific batsman is under a two-year contract as a batting consultant with the Warriors, the Eastern Cape franchise team based in Port Elizabeth (East London).

Firstly he has to settle this contract with the Warriors, as he is in the mid of the contract by involving with them for one season thus far.

Kirsten was pretty happy about how things had come out after the interview. According to Kirsten, “The interview went well, but I haven't signed anything yet."

Besides that he has also got family commitments back home which need to be sorted out before he joins Team India officially. Kirsten is quite hopeful that he will be able to make it on time.

"I am very interested, otherwise, I would not have come all the way here," said Kirsten.

It is known that Kirsten name has been zeroed upon by the BCCI after an interview done by the coach selection committee comprising former captains S. Venkatraghavan, Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri, BCCI joint secretary Mahendra Pandove, treasurer N. Srinivasan and secretary Niranjan Shah on late Monday night in the capital.

Pandove could not attend the meeting where India captain Anil Kumble was a special invitee.

“He was interviewed by the coach selection committee and everyone was satisfied at the end of it. It is for Gary to decide. We have asked him to confirm the offer within a week,” said BCCI Vice-president Rajiv Shukla here on Tuesday.

There is also a strange facet that came in to the light, as Kirsten name was not in the 22 applications list received by the BCCI. The South African was not one of the applicants for the job, but was approached to take it up. Kirsten has been offered a two-year contract and his basic salary could be somewhere around $300,000 annually.

The Board had received 22 applications for the job but the coach selection committee was not impressed by the list of candidates. “The Board had given Gavaskar, Venkatraghavan and Shastri the responsibility of identifying a coach who would be acceptable to the players and also deliver the goods,” said Shukla.

Skipper Kumble’s valuable inputs were reportedly very important in the Board agreeing to Kirsten as the best candidate available.

The ball is now in the Kirsten hands whether he opts for the job or once again land BCCI’s top brass in a soup by not confirming for the post.

The 40-year-old Kirsten played 101 Tests and scored 7,289 runs at 45.27 with 21 centuries and 185 one-day internationals scoring 6,798 runs at 40.95 with 13 centuries. He quit in 2004 and worked as a batting coach for the senior Proteas team before becoming Cricket South Africa’s high performance manager.