Thank You, Cricket Canada.
There are a variety of things that you could have predicted on a whiteboard ahead of Canada’s World Cup campaign. Most importantly, you could have predicted the favouritism and partialities that would come into fray ahead of Canada’s maiden appearance in a T20I World Cup. One thing would still remain constant – Harsh Thaker batting at No.4 for Canada. Somehow, Cricket Canada has managed to change the narrative on that too and drop their best player since Nitish Kumar; who also now plays for United States of America. Congratulations to the Cricket Canada – you have managed to put your ego over the interests of the nation once again to ruin another homegrown dreams.
International Cricket Council (ICC) had set May 25th as the official deadline to make changes to squads submitted earlier in the month. This means teams can drop and pick anyone without requiring approval from the Event Technical Committee. It got a little interesting when rumours started spreading in the mainstream media about coach Pubudu Dassanayake being sacked (and reinstated), Srimantha Wijeyaratne and Ammar Khalid winning a case against Cricket Canada where Sport Dispute Resolution Centre of Canada (SDRCC) ruled they were dropped unfairly and 10 out of 13 players signing a letter stating that the coach has extensive conflicts of interest in his selections. This letter was not signed by skipper Saad Bin Zafar, opener Aaron Johnson and bowling all rounder Dilon Heyliger. Kanwarpal Tathgur and Tejinder Singh did not travel with the squad to St. Kitts as part of the T20 World Cup preparations. Amidst all of that, the icing on the cake arrived on the afternoon of May 23rd when Cricket Canada announced a revised squad on their social platforms. The list of players hits you in the face directly because it has no mention of Canada’s best player – Harsh Thaker. That’s like dropping Shakib Al Hasan, Virat Kohli, Heinrich Klassen or even Gerhard Erasmus without any justification.
Initial reactions and questions about the absence of Harsh Thaker resulted in few domestic players confirming that he had met with an unfortunate ankle injury. At that moment, no matter who you are, there’s a sense of despair and sympathy you feel towards a player who put everything out there for Canada. Harsh played on when Canada were nowhere near returning to top flight cricket, he developed his game massively since the 2016 U19 World Cup, won Player of the Year for Super9, won Emerging Player of the Year at the GT20. He is Canada’s poster boy and their best player ever since Nitish Kumar jumped ship across the border. Surely, they couldn’t do him dirty?
All that chatter about a potential ankle injury changed when members of Harsh’s immediate family raised questions about his absence in the squad. Conversations with his sister revealed that Harsh was recovering and would be able to play a part in the tournament after the first game. In a 4 game group-stage tournament, surely you would be flexible to include your best player and have him available for 3 out of 4 games? The confirmation arrived when vice-captain Harsh Thaker took to social media to verify exactly what had occurred to him in the past 2.5 weeks that led to this situation. It’s comical that a squad is announced and no communication is sent out about the absence of a key member of the squad. Hence, the fact he was injured the past 2.5–3 weeks and no one knew about it is also not surprising.
Despite being told that he would have a fitness test on May 24th, Cricket Canada National Board dropped him from the squad by announcing the revised squad a day earlier. To avoid communication with your marquee player and vice-captain when he is seeking clarification for such a bizarre step is definitely in line with how Cricket Canada and it’s employees operate. It’s no surprise that board members have declined to respond to him as they are more concerned about protecting the spots of underwhelming players such as Ravinderpal Singh and Navneet Dhaliwal.
In the same GT20 Canada tournament where Harsh Thaker was Emerging Player of the Year, both Ravinderpal and Navneet were dropped from their respective franchises. What’s even better is that Ravinderpal was allowed to go play private tournament BC Big Bash during the tournament to regain form but still flew all the way to British Columbia to hit a first ball duck. He’s slow in the field, doesn’t offer anything with the ball and often will get other guys run out. But with the powers of British Columbia imminent within Cricket Canada, his selection was always guaranteed and Harsh was the chosen scapegoat. Navneet is a similar story where his scoring rate is abysmal, his fielding is nothing to write home about and he was even getting rapped on the pads by Dilon Heyliger during the Blue Jays commercial. These are the players going to the World Cup while the best player in the country keeps his couch warm at home.
Questions you have to ask are whether the board couldn’t be flexible enough for a player of Harsh’s stature to be able to go through the fitness test assigned for him on May 24th. When the coach and selectors are good with persisting with Harsh as long as he passes the fitness tests, who are the board to overrule that decision made by the team management? As per his post, he would be good to go half way through the tournament and even then, Harsh is a much better choice on any day. If he wasn’t fit to continue, Canada is not far away that a replacement cannot be called on. The board also had the option of taking a travelling reserve should Harsh pull up unfit to feature halfway through the tournament. This wouldn’t be the first time that a player is allowed to be a part of the squad with an eye on having him feature in some part of the tournament. Australia did this with Travis Head in the recently concluded ODI World Cup and his return reignited World Cup campaign where they went on to win the silverware. Finding out on social media that you have been dropped is not the first time it’s happened in cricket but the clear disrespect faced by a guy who’s a real trump card is rather puzzling.
Another important question is whether captain Saad Bin Zafar stood up for the injustice faced by his vice or did he just go along with the decisions made by the bosses? It’s very clear that Zafar steers clear from controversy and is cautious in coming up against his bosses. The level of corruption in play here is absolutely shocking but not unexpected. Harsh Thaker deserved to be at the World Cup more than anyone in that squad and it is a shame that the world will not get to see the skills and talent he had to display. It’s truly a shame that his drifter will not go through Yashasvi Jaiswal or Fakhar Zaman’s defences or his six over midwicket to a marquee pacer for the world to sit up and take notice. This is a move that has united all of the cricket fraternity in the country and the collective disgust towards Cricket Canada is one that gives you comfort.
This article has been updated with inputs from Harsh Thaker. Harsh was not part of the touring squad to St. Kitts and had no part to play in the letter that was signed against coach Pubudu Dassanayake.
