I think this should be the XI India should target to play for the Asia Cup opener:
· Virender Sehwag
· Sachin Tendulkar
· Gautam Gambhir
· MS Dhoni
· Suresh Raina
· Virat Kohli
· Rohit Sharma
· Harbhajan Singh
· Zaheer Khan
· Pragyan Ojha
· Ashish Nehra
The 4 other guys should be:
· Ishant Sharma
· Robin Uthappa
· Yuvraj Singh
· Praveen Kumar / Ashok DInda / Ashwin
I believe Srikanth would have a strong temptation to retain one of Karthik or Vijay in team or draft in Badrinath as replacement for one to one TN batsman, but that move needs to be countered and opposed. But that’s wishful thinking. Nothing of that sort would happen.
Actually in all recent selection committees, the current panel is most regional biased and more of rag headed. I thought DBV was one of the selection chiefs who got more Mumbai lads (not deserving) in the team, but given Srikanth ’s track record DBV looked sane enough.
DBV sacked Ganguly and Dravid from the ODI team, removed Virender Sehwag from Tests and installed Gautam Gambhir at the top of Tests in 2008 SL series which reunited the Delhi dashing duo at the top and that move was the master stroke from the DBV panel after promoting MSD to captaincy in 2007 after RSD resigned post England tour.
He got in Rohit Sharma on 2007 tour to England and installed Wasim Jaffer at the top in 2006. He had brief spells of success (super series in India vs Pak and reasonably good one in England), but his Aussie failings saw him axed. Besides DBV also axed Ajit Agarkar(another Mumbai player who seems lot better even today than the current crop of fast bowlers) from the team in 2007 (post T20 WC victory). DBV wanted to make Sachin captain after Rahul resigned, but later on settled for Anil Kumble which was good move too. He led the team to first victory in Perth (something only WI did in entire 1990s and 2000s) and during the Sydney gate.
Now if you compare KS track record to DBV, KS fails badly. He not only selected a pathetic team in SA tests just after we went # 1 in Tests but also selected dud teams for both 2009 and 2010 editions of T20 World cups. He blindly promoted TN players at cost of results in the national team. Nobody resents a player selection as long as its on merit, but if 3-4 players make in the XI just cos the selection chief is from a particular state and the selection moves backfires, then the selections are going to be questioned.
In 2008 Murali Vijay was drafted in as replacement opener in 3rd Test vs Australia when GG was fined and missed out the Test, but Vijay went on to have a gutsy debut and played couple of more solid knocks to earn praise and even raise hopes of being next Dravid. He was fast tracked to ODIs in 2010 SA series and later on based of a decent iPL run he was moved into the World T20 squad which had no Sehwag. As a result his confidence vanished and the results in Zimbabwe show a very poor record for Vijay, who still should be a good Test player. His ODIs average and T20I average read poor readings (below 20s) and the failure in the Ahmedabad Test in SA series dropped his Test average to low 30s. He has not got consistent run in Tests (and won’t get too since he is an opener and there is no vacancy in the middle order for now).
Badrinath was other player who popped in every time when anybody was injured. He has had decent run in domestic cricket but when played at the top he has found himself in failures. He might be in the contention for the next Test India plays for # 6 spot.
Dinesh Karthik, well a lot has been said on him at this blog, but he is just everywhere. He keeps and fails, he bats and fails, he runs and fails. Yet he keeps coming back. Nobody needs him. Go please. Srikanth.
He has made the other committee members irrelevant. When 2 members of 1980s team took over it was believed that they would think in terms of larger interests of the team than the regional interests as during their playing days a lot of players made into the team on regional basis. Srikanth failed that thinking and it’s the root cause for the T20 disasters and the mauling in 1st SA test in 2010 and the failures in CT 2009 with the latest debacle in Zimbabwe.
Few hours later he is going to unveil another team for Asia Cup which media reports suggest would mark Dravid comeback and Sachin resting owing to the IPL injury. KS has always been temperamental in his cricket. Be it during his batting in Tests or ODIs (he at one time was highest run getter for India in ODIs). And ditto for selection decisions. Some things never change.
