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KKR supremo explains why dropping Ganguly was ‘not that difficult’ a decision

by Wisden Staff 2-minute read

Kolkata Knight Riders CEO Venky Mysore, recalling his decision not to retain iconic captain Sourav Ganguly ahead of the 2011 Indian Premier League, explained why it was ‘not that difficult’ for him despite the flak that came their way.

Ganguly was named KKR’s icon player ahead of the inaugural edition of the tournament in 2008, and led the side that year as well as in the 2010 tournament. However, the team’s poor performance – they finished sixth, eighth and sixth respectively in the first three seasons – resulted in him getting released before the 2011 tournament.

The decision didn’t go down well with the fans, but Mysore, whose first big step upon joining the franchise after the 2010 IPL was to revamp the squad, has now said it wasn’t a difficult decision for him.

“I’ll break that down into two parts,” Mysore said on The RK Show. “Personally, for me, it didn’t seem like a big decision, only because I was unattached to it. If I had been part of the organisation for three years, or even one year or two years, it would have been a tougher decision.

“This was like someone completely coming in from the outside, which is what I was, literally from the outside. Eventually, I realised, that for the organisation and for the owners, in particular, it was tough. It’s a decision and an approach that I proposed as somebody who had been given the mandate.”

It certainly seemed to work. KKR reached the IPL playoffs in their first season without Ganguly, and followed it up with a title in the next under the leadership of Gautam Gambhir. There was another title in 2014, but they have failed to make the final since.

“I look back at it, and I basically said that, ‘I don’t know if it’s the right thing to do or not, and we may fall flat on our face. But, it’s a different approach. Are we all on board with this?’ If I would attribute one of the many things that contributed to whatever success we have had is the fact that the owners – Shah Rukh [Khan], Jay [Mehta], Juhi [Chawla] – have completely stood behind the decisions I have proposed.

“I am not a maverick lone-ranger who runs off and wants to do my own thing. But at the same time, in my entire career, I was used to being given the autonomy to operate and to also be accountable at the same time.

“But it could easily have been a micro-managed type of a situation, or second-guessing the decisions I have made, or to basically say that ‘yeah, but we made those announcements, but let’s not do it’. But they stood completely behind me. That is why they took a lot of flak and heat for that. As an organisation, therefore, it was tougher for them. But to be perfectly honest, it was not that difficult for me to make that decision.”

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