A total of 646 young, aspiring cricketers took part in bowling talent search by the BCCI at Dharamshala on February 18 and 19. The team of selectors, headed by former Indian cricketer and coach, Sandip Patil has shortlisted 30 names that include budding fast bowlers and spinners from neighbouring states of Punjab, Haryana and Delhi as well.
These include 12 boys from Punjab, 8 from Delhi, 7 from Himachal, 2 from UP and 1 from Haryana.
The joint secretary of BCCI Anuraag Thakur said that this number shall further be reduced to 6 in second phase. The BCCI shall select 25 raw boys from Himachal, J & K, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh to club them with equal number of bowlers selected from BCCI’s different tournament and train them for 2 years in Boards academies at Chandigarh, Mumbai and Chennai. BCCi’s this method of selection is to give the fair opportunity to boys in 17-22 years group to make a second bowling line for team
Earlier these trial were for only Himachal youth but after receiving so much youth from the neighbour State, Board allowed them to participate, Col (Retd) H S Manhas, General Manager (Adm) of Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association said “Initially, it was only for Himachal Pradesh, but when so many youth reached Dharamshala, we sought a clarification from the Board of Cricket Control of India on whether to allow the outsiders.
