Former Mumbai wicketkeeper batsman Sulakshan Kulkarni has been named coach of the Mumbai Ranji team. He succeeds Praveen Amre. The decision was taken at a meeting of the Cricket Improvement Committee of the Mumbai Cricket Association here on Monday.
Kulkarni was chosen ahead of Sanjay Bangar, Zubin Barucha, Zulfikar Parkar and Sandeep Dahad at the marathon meeting which lasted for more than four hours. The meeting was chaired by former India stumper Chandrakant Pandit.
Balwinder Singh Sandhu, also a CIC member, was asked if he was interested in the job but the World Cup winner declined the offer. Then, CIC decided to give the job to the 44-year-old Kulkarni, who is currently the coach of Vidarbha Ranji team.
“We discussed all names and their finer points but we finally settled for Sulakshan. We’ve also asked Sandhu whether he could take up the job but he didn’t want to. It had been too long and we didn’t want to waste time. We wanted to appoint the coach as early as possible,” Pandit said.
“What was impressive about Sulakshan was that he is focussed on two important aspects of Mumbai cricket. Having a strong bench strength and winning the Ranji Trophy is what he had planned for. Apart from that he has passion for Mumbai cricket and the khadoos attitude which every Mumbaikar should have,” added the CIC chief. “He has good strategies to perform and the focus was on having a strong bench strength.” However, the term of the coach has not been decided.
Meanwhile, Padmakar Shivalkar has been replaced by Milind Rege as the chairman of the senior selection committee. Abey Kuruvila and Pradeep Kasliwal are the other new selectors. They come in place of Kiran Mokashi and Sameer Dighe. Abdul Ismail has retained his place in the committee.
