Kirsten almost certain to take over as India coach…

Former South African opening batsman Gary Kirsten will take over as new Indian coach next week, a top cricket board official told on Tuesday. Kirsten will join the team on December 3, just two weeks before India leave for Australia to play four Tests and a triangular One-day series also featuring Sri Lanka. "We have decided to appoint Kirsten as the coach. A formal announcement will be made in Kolkata," the official said on condition of anonymity. India will take on Pakistan in the second Test in Kolkata on Friday. Kirsten, 40, was interviewed here on Monday by a coach selection committee comprising among others former captains Sunil Gavaskar, Ravi Shastri and Srinivasan Venkataraghavan. The left-handed South African opener quit international cricket in 2004 after scoring 7,289 runs in 101 Tests. India have been without a regular coach since April, when former Australian captain Greg Chappell resigned after the South Asian nation's shock first-round exit from the World Cup in the Caribbean. Three men have been in temporary charge since then after South Africa's Graham Ford, who coaches English county Kent, turned down an offer from the cash-rich Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). Former all-rounder Shastri managed the team for the tour of Bangladesh in May. Veteran Chandu Borde, 73, took over during the visit to Ireland and England from July to September. Former Mumbai first-class cricketer Lalchand Rajput then took charge at the inaugural Twenty20 Worlds in South Africa in September, which India won, and continued for the home One-dayers against Australia and Pakistan.