Wednesday, January 11, 2006

Should Sourav be in playing XI for the first Test?

A lot has happened since I had my last post. Many changes for better. If you have gone through my previous post you will instantly recognise that I am not the greatest fan of Ganguly. But I feel that he should be in the playing XI for the first test. At whose cost he should brought in ? I am not sure about it. But he should be given a fair chance.

If Ganguly is given an opportunity to open I think he should take it. As Yuvraj is playing nice in middle order I dont think so he will be opening or in worst case he might be dropped in favour of Ganguly If India opts for regualr openers.

Yesterday I saw an interview of Chappel on Ganguly. It looks as if he is saying that Ganguly is going to sit in bench. I am not happy about it.He is not our best test batsmen but still a good bat whom I believe still can contribute to Indian cricket with World Cup in mind.

His achivements in ODI's are second only to Tendulkar. As far as ODI's are considered he can still win matches for India and and score big. He should be there in our World Cup team. But his test record is not that impressive. He can be given a clear time frame to perform or be out of the Test squad not be just dumped as happened in third test.

My Squad for first test will be

Shewag
Ganguly
Dravid
Tendulkar
Laxman
Yuvraj
Dhoni
Irfan
Agarkar
Harbajan
Kumble

3 comments:

drsundeep said...

I would rather think that Dada's wasted as an opener as he doesn't have the technique for an opener. Its all very easy in the ODIs where you have all sorts of ridiculous field restrictions, but not so in tests where you have 3-4 slips, gully, forward short leg and a silly point. Whats more Dada just isn't good against good new ball attack. He's always been a middle order batsman, coming in when the ball's old. So throwing him all of a sudden against Akhtar, Sami et al would be suicidal. But who knows - even Veeru was never supposed to be an opener!
But I definately cannot agree with the fact that Dada should be playing in the 2007 WC. He would be 35 then and even in his prime he's never been a great fielder or a decent runner between wickets. With the likes of Yuvraj, Kaif, Dhoni, Pathan etc in the side it would be foolhardy to sacrifice one of these in order to retain Dada! He could continue in the team all these years not bcoz he was a great batsman, but due to sole the fact that he's been our most successful captain so far. How long do you think the selectors would have retained him in the face of his continued poor form, if he wouldn't have been the captain? When better players like Darren Lehman, Michel Bevan of Aus and Nathan Astle of NZ can be dropped just for being on the wrong side of 30, whats the big deal in dropping Dada? 2morrow the same situation's going to arise when Sachin or Dravid are going to grow old. Are we going to keep on repeating the same mistake? NO ONE IS INDISPENSABLE, THEIR PREVIOUS CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE TEAM NOTWITHSTANDING!!! Dada should see the writing on the wall and retire gracefully rather being booted out unceremoniously. Vijay Merchant had remarked when asked why he wished to retire at the height of his prowess "Its better to retire when people are asking WHY, rather than them asking WHEN!

Anonymous said...

Is it a mere co-incidence that in the present day Indian Cricket team as well as all the stars of Indian Cricket in the recent past belongs to Brahmin community? I know that bringing caste discussion in cricket arena will make many eyebrows to raise. But I really cant help. I just read an article at Merinews. Here is the link: http://www.merinews.com/newsPortal/JSP/catFull.jsp?articleID=238&catID=5&category=Sports

You people read it and see. The questions the writer asked about cricket are really interseting and I dont have the answers. If you have post it below the article in the comment section. Dont miss it. Its really worthy to be thought over

Anonymous said...

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