The Right Choice at the Right Time: Vengsarkar and Patil’s Role in Dhawan’s Selection

Former India opener Shikhar Dhawan owes a great deal of his accomplishments to Mumbai natives Sandeep Patil and Dilip Vengsarkar, two legends of Indian cricket. These two made certain that Dhawan was chosen at the ideal juncture in his professional life.

During their time serving as head national selectors, Vengsarkar and Patil both made tough, and occasionally contentious, choices, but they are still praised for seeing emerging talent and selecting players at the right time.

Dhawan was included for India’s selection for the third Test against the visiting Australians in Mohali at Patil’s request at the beginning of March 2013.

Dhawan made his impression right away by blasting a stunning 187 off just 174 balls, including an 85-ball century – the fastest by any hitter on Test debut. He replaced the legendary Virender Sehwag, who was going through a lean period at the time.

“You should support a young cricketer who’s in form. Getting the right opportunity at the right time is extremely important. At that point, Shikhar had just returned from India A’s South African tour after scoring a double century and a century there. Unfortunately, we had to make a tough call. All my four co-selectors opposed my decision (to select Dhawan over Sehwag), but ultimately, something good happened. He scored a hundred on his Test debut.

It validated my decision to choose him. I’d like not to claim the credit for this. Shikhar deserves praise from me since he validated my choice. He delivered me!” Patil said on Sunday.

Years before to this, Dhawan gained notoriety at the Under-19 World Cup in Dhaka in 2004 as the competition’s top run scorer. With an average of 84.16 and 505 runs in seven innings, the left-hander lit up the game.

Few people know that Dhawan’s selection in that tournament was made possible in large part by Vengsarkar, as Dhawan was first dropped by the then-India Under-19 selectors after he didn’t perform well in two testing matches in Mumbai.

Vengsarkar recalled the incident as follows to: “In 2004, while serving as the head of the BCCI’s Talent Research Development Wing (TRDW), Jagmohan Dalmiya, the BCCI president at the time, requested that I attend all of the meetings of the India Under-19 team’s selection committee.

“The BCCI had scheduled two one-day selection trial matches at Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium ahead to the team announcement, but I was unable to attend because of a prior commitment. I saw Shikhar’s name was missing from the squad when it was announced. I had been observing him since his days as an Under-16. I was told matches when I questioned the selectors about why he was dropped.

I pushed for his inclusion, telling them that it wouldn’t matter if he lost these two matches. Pick him; he’s a good player. To their credit, the selectors took my advice into consideration and chose Dhawan. In the end, he scored the most runs in the competition.”

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