In two weeks (or thereabouts) the Indian team for the World Cup will be announced. Here's the team I would select
In Batting Order:
1. Saurav Ganguly: Stabilizing factor at the top of the order. Loads of experience. Can bowl a few overs and not a bad short fine leg fielder (Couldnt think of a better place to hide him in the field)
2. Robin Uthappa: In the form of his life. Young and fields quite well. His assault on the Windies was quite spectacular even when read on Cricinfo
3. Sachin Tendulkar: Could be in better form, but a telling statistic of his Chennai innings yesterday .. 60 of 66 balls .. just two fours .. Rotates the strike well, has probably seen everything that can be seen in a one-day game. Bowls dibbly-dobblies enough for 2-3 overs
4. Rahul Dravid: Captain . Nuff said
5. Yuvraj Singh (if fit) : Back from injury, needs a few games under his belt to lose the rust. But if fit, he selects himself
6. M.S. Dhoni: Adequate behind the wickets, can tonk the ball if needed.
7. Irfan Pathan: Still the best allrounder we have without a doubt. Safe bat, can bowl 4 overs at least (4 overs for 40 still should be fine for me) Pathan, Sachin, Yuvraj and Ganguly take the 5th bowler's role, in that order
8. Harbhajan Singh.: Tough to choose between him and Kumble. Literally chosen on ability to dive.
9. Ajit Agarkar: My sis-in-law will kill me for this. But when you have 268 wickets in the ODI game, I'd still take him over a Sreesanth
10. Zaheer Khan: Been our best bowler over the past year (Sreesanth notwithstanding) and is probably the only bowler who will be an auto-selection. Though, why Dravid prefers Agarkar over him for the slog overs is beyond me
11. Sreesanth: Taken (in the XI) solely because of the rumor going around that the pitches will be more suitable for the quicks, and the Aussies are bowling 4 fast men. Decent fielder, dives around, and gives it the fullest. And at least can break into a jig once in a while:) .. That, and my wife is a Mallu..
12. Anil Kumble: Check #8. Not picked in the playing XI solely on diving ability. Will be taken if either of the quicks are in a bad mood.
13. Mohd. Kaif: Backup for Yuvraj and a great great fielder. Adequate in the middle order though we are in deep shit if Yuvraj is unfit. Preferred to Raina thanks to his experience.
14. Dinesh Karthik: Good bat, great fielder, backup wicketkeeper. I'd pick him over Dhoni in a crisis, but Dhoni's slog over prowess wins in the playing XI
15. Munaf Patel (if fit): Good bowler for overs 10-25. Has to be supremely fit and should only be taken if he is going to bowl his 10 overs through. Since short fine leg is already taken, don't know where we can hide him in the field.
Notable omissions:
1. Virender Sehwag. Had to choose between him and Uthappa. Trumps in the bowling and experience departments. But his weaknesses are well documented. Uthappa's are not. That plus the fact that I wouldn't be able to bear with Virender "Mayur" Sehwag ads at 3 in the morning.
2. Suresh Raina. Had to chose between him and Kaif. But he just doesnt go over 30.
There's my team. Feel free to comment and post your feedback.
5 comments:
Love Tendulkar! He just scored a century in Baroda...I miss watching cricket...hopefully will be able to catch some of the world cup...atleast the games will be on at more descent hours.
Notable Omission:
VVS.
I would very much like to see VVS too. We could just get him to play against Australia. But my guess is that it is going to be your squad, with Sehwag instead of Kaif.
Sehwag is a very useful off-spinner. I would take him as an all-rounder in my team who can bat at 6 or 7 and bowl about 8-10 overs in each game. I'm sure his figures will be something like 10-1-42-1 in each game in the West Indies which is very good. Plus a few quick-fire run-a-ball 20s with some good fielding and superb catching.
Sehwag will be in my World Cup 15 any day. Even World Cup XI.
i wud drop kaif and take sehwag over him.
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