A day before the window for the applications for Team India’s coaching staff closes, captain Virat Kohli has backed Ravi Shastri for continuing as the head coach.
Shastri and the rest of the coaching staff’s tenure was originally until the 2019 World Cup, but the BCCI extended that till the end of India’s tour of USA and West Indies, which is scheduled to get over on September 3.
“With Ravi bhai, all of us have a great camaraderie, everyone in the team shares mutual respect [with him]. And we have done really well together as a group,” Kohli said at the pre-departure press conference for the tour of USA and West Indies.
“Yeah, we will definitely be very happy if he is continuing as a coach, but as I said it is upon the CAC to seek my advice or opinion if they want. Right now, I haven’t been contacted at all. And I don’t know what is going to happen with the process.”
The Shastri-Kohli duo may have failed to win the T20 World Cup in 2016 and the ODI World Cup in 2015 and 2019, but they helped India climb to the top of the ICC Test rankings with a historic series triumph in Australia.
Shastri was the team director till June 2016 until India lost in the T20 World Cup semi-finals before being reappointed as head coach in 2017.
The interviews of applicants for Team India’s head coach are likely to take place on August 13 and/or August 14. The deadline for filing the applications for the coach and support staff is July 30.
