Dungarpur calls upon ICC to address burn out issue

Varanasi, May 14 (UNI) Terming the burn out problem as a major issue in international cricket, former BCCI president Raj Singh Dungarpur today called upon the International Cricket Council (ICC) to urgently come up with a solution.

Interacting with newspersons here on the sidelines of the inauguration of a cricket academy here, Mr Dungarpur, famous for his candid comments said that recent utterances by cricket personalities inlcuding Virender Sehwag and Greg Chappel, underscored that the burn out issue was a significant matter.

''The BCCI or any of the other national cricketing bodies cannot solve the matter individually, but needed to work it out on an ICC forum. The ICC should work actively and urgently to address the issue,'' he added.

The burn out problem can, however, be addressed to some extent by the Indian cricket selectors also by creating a strong bench strength. ''We should have at least 22 players ready to be blooded into the the national squad and not only the first 16 who are in the team,'' he maintained.

''A strong bench not only provides rest to the jaded players in the main team, but also puts extra pressue to perfrom on those of the illustrious many who might take their place in the team for granted,'' he said.

Calling upon the Indian cricket team to idolise the Australians to accomplish the motive of beating the latter, Mr Dungarpur said that professionalism and peerless athletecism of the Aussies was worth aping. ''Australia, South Africa, West Indies or New Zealand, all are known as nations that have produced atheletes. This has also worked wonders for their cricket team, which had outsmarted opponents through sheer atheleticsm best accentuated in quicksilver fielding and running between the wickets,'' he added.

Mr Dungarpur further said that India needs to become a nation of atheletes for achieving cricketing excellence.

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