Four new faces in team for Bangladesh Test
Ashish Magotra
Four new faces figure in the Indian team for the one-off Test against Bangladesh from November 10 to 14.
The selection committee of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, which met in Bombay on Monday, included opening batsman S S Das, pace bowler Zaheer Khan, wicketkeeper Saba Karim and allrounder Yuvraj Singh in the 14-man squad that will take on cricket's minnows in their inaugural Test at Dhaka.
Announcing the team, BCCI secretary Jaywant Lele said Rahul Dravid, who flew back from Sharjah following an injury to his finger, should recover in a week and be fit to play in the Test.
He said Javagal Srinath, who has issued a certificate stating that he is fully fit to return to the thick of action, has been included in the squad provisionally and his performances will be evaluated during a Ranji Trophy match at Hyderabad from November 1 to 4.
On Saba Karim's inclusion, Lele said the Bengal wicketkeeper's inclusion was at skipper Sourav Ganguly's insistence.
He informed that Das will open the innings while V V S Laxman will bat in the middle order.
The 22-year-old Orissa opener, who recently had a stint at the Australian Cricket Academy, had a pretty successful last season with 799 runs in nine domestic games at an average of 49.93, with two hundreds and five fifties.
Das's inclusion will mean that Laxman has finally been relieved of the opener’s job. Laxman scored eight first class hundreds last season, six in the Ranji trophy and two in Australia. In 11 matches and 17 innings, he aggregated 1,432 runs at an average of 89.50, with a personal best of 353 runs.
Laxman has always been uncomfortable opening the innings and on more than one occasion voiced his displeasure. His 23 innings as an opener have fetched him just 658 runs, at an average of 28.61. He has a single ton to his credit and five half-centuries.
The stylish Hyderabad batsman has also played at number 3, 5, 6 and 7. Number six is where he has been most successful -- he scored 51 valuable runs against South Africa at Ahmedabad and seemed to
settle well into that slot.
Promising Mumbai opener Wasim Jaffer has been left in the lurch once again. Asked about his omission, Lele told rediff.com: "Jaffer had already proved himself at the international level and will be considered for the series against Australia. We want to give youngsters a chance," he said.
Meanwhile, Lele informed that Geoff Marsh, the former Aussie opener and coach, will be in Bombay on Monday evening and will meet with BCCI officials to discuss the coaching job in the next copuple of days. A decision on the foreign coach for the Indian team is expected on November 2. The other contenders for the job are John Wright of
New Zealand and Greg Chappell of Australia.
The coach will take over before the Zimbabwe tour, till which time Anshuman Gaekwad will be in charge.
The team for the Test against Bangladesh:
Sourav Ganguly (captain)
Sachin Tendulkar
Rahul Dravid
S Ramesh
V V S Laxman
S S Das
Javagal Srinath
Zaheer Khan
Yuvraj Singh
Ajit Agarkar
Saba Karim (wicketkeeper)
Venkatesh Prasad
Sunil Joshi
Murali Kartik
The selection committee also decided on the Board's President XI to play Zimbabwe at Indore. Hrishikesh Kanitkar will lead the team.
The team:
Connor Williams
Ravneet Ricky
Hrishikesh Kanitkar
Abhijeet Kale
Hemang Badani
Virendra Sehwag
Abbas Ali
Vijay Bharadwaj
Vijay Dahiya
Debashish Mohanty
Santosh Saxena
Iqbal Siddiqui
Rahul Sanghvi
Ashish Kapoor
The India 'A' team which will take on the Zimbabweans
Vinayak Mane
Sridharan Sriram
Niraj Patel
Mohammed Kaif
Gautam Ganbir
Reetinder Singh Sodhi
Ajay Ratra
Rajesh Powar
Sarandeep Singh
Rakesh Dhruv
Mritunjay Tripathi
Rakesh Patel
Nikhil Doru
Faizal Mohammad
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