Team for ODI series named
Laxman, Zaheer left out
Coach Chappell is running the team the way he wants, finally, sidelining some old favorites in favor of younger bucks. Ganguly is injured of course, but Laxman, apparently, is just old. Same for Zaheer. Stepping up to take their places are 19-year old Kerala pacer S Sreesanth and Suresh Raina. Chappell’s strategy of producing a strong set of fast bowlers seems to be in effect here.
From NDTV:
While Sourav Ganguly’s absence from the team can be attributed to his elbow injury, Laxman has reason to feel aggrieved at his exclusion.
He was dropped last year for the Bangladesh series, brought back this year for the Sri Lanka series, then he scored 158 runs in two innings as captain of India A in the Challenger Series. But clearly, he does not have age on his side.
On the other hand, Zaheer might have age on his side, but is once again on the sidelines. This, in spite of picking up nine wickets in the two Tests in Zimbabwe at around 20 runs a wicket. But the selectors insist that form and not age will still be the criteria.
Here’s the team:
Rahul Dravid (captain), Virender Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh, Venugopala Rao, Suresh Raina, M S Dhoni, Harbhajan Singh, Murali Karthik, Irfan Pathan, Ajit Agarkar, J P Yadav, Sreesanth, Gautam Gambhir and R P Singh.
It’ll be a tough match against Sri Lanka, so I hope they are ready! I’ll be here to report when the results are in, so stay tuned.