Dilip Vengsarkar appointed director of National Cricket Academy

Vengsarkar has a glowing reputation for spotting and grooming young talent

Former India captain Dilip Vengsarkar has been appointed as the director of the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bangalore by the BCCI, reports ESPN Cricinfo. He also revealed that he will not to accept any fee in this capacity, so as to avoid any future conflict of interest.

Vengsarkar admitted that he accepted the offer readily and said his main priority was to revitalise the NCA. After enchancing his reputation as one of the finest developers of grassroots cricket in India with the establishment of Talent Resource Development Wing (TRDW) in 2002, he will once again look to groom young talent.

“Over the years it [NCA] has been the supply line for Indian international cricket," Vengsarkar said. "It is challenging to spot and groom talent from all over India. There is a huge amount of talent in India, but it has to be groomed and nurtured and the NCA can play an important role in that process.”

The 59-year-old also said he thought that the NCA has become stale. “For the last four to five years, it is as good as defunct. And it had no direction,” he said.

“So I will have to focus on the restructuring and make sure that Indian cricket can get good cricketers and we can have a good bench strength.”

Brijesh Patel, who stepped down from the post of NCA director, due to the conflict-of-interest guidelines introduced by BCCI President Shashank Manohar, took over for a second term after last year’s IPL. Patel, is also the secretary of the Karnataka State Cricket Association and the director of cricket operations for Royal Challengers Bangalore.

Manohar made his intentions clear soon after taking over as the BCCI president. “The board would also look into the starting of National Cricket Academy again, whose activities are not up to the mark as of date," Manohar said.

“And we would see to it that the NCA functions round the year so that cricketing talent is developed in this country. Today we are short of the second line. There are no spinners in this country. So it is also our duty to see to it that we have an available lot as a replacement for the current players.”

Vengsarkar, who is renowned for his ability to scout and groom talent from his time as the chairman of the national selection committee, said he is yet to formulate a plan for the NCA, but promised that he would present it to the NCA board in the first week of December.

Veteran administrator Niranjan Shah, former Indian opener Chetan Chauhan and Vengsarkar will now head the NCA board, which is a BCCI sub-committee. The other members are Amitabh Choudhary (BCCI joint secretary), Vishal Marwah (North), Subir Ganguly (East zone), Prashant Vaidya (Central) and Sanjay Desai (South).