Delhi's 2022-23 Ranji Trophy campaign has suffered one blow after another.

On Wednesday, Khoda, the former India batter and a national selector during MSK Prasad's tenure as selection chief, alleged that Sidhana had tried to push for "dubious candidates" in the U-25 team.

Sidhana walked out in protest, saying that he had done so because of "certain selections" made by Khoda and Anil Bhardwaj, the third member of the selection panel. "Even secretary Siddharth Verma didn't pay heed to my objections," Sidhana, a former Punjab player, told PTI. "Mr Khoda didn't watch any of the Under-25 trial games and the other selector Mr Bhardwaj only wants one player in the team, Vikas Solanki.

"My contention was his performance when given a chance earlier in BCCI Under-25 tournaments hadn't been great, but they insisted on going by trial-game results. I can't support unfair practices."

Badoni opens, while frontline openers sit out

Prior to the fourth round of matches, Badoni was slotted in as an opener, even as designated vice-captain Himmat Singh was dropped. Senior batter Nitish Rana, too, has been out of favour, while regular wicketkeeper Anuj Rawat has been relegated to the U-25 team.

"Look, we select a team and the coach selects the playing XI. We don't interfere," Khoda said when asked about the selection shuffle.

Injuries haven't helped Delhi either

"You had no pre-season camp, no proper training session and fast bowlers were highly under-cooked," a senior DDCA official had lamented to PTI as the slew of injuries surfaced. "There was no planning, no vision and what has now happened is exactly what was supposed to happen without systems in place. Some of the pacers were unfit before the season."