We are round about ten matches away from the all important world cup and for the first time ever it does look like we have a team at our disposal that matches the pre- cup hype
Unlike the earlier occasions, we now have excellent bench strength which not only makes the management feel secured when team India starts its campaign come February, it also keeps those in the playing eleven on their toes all the time. The fact that the world cup is staged in the sub-continent does have its own advantage for our team, as even a few otherwise good players might look unassailable under home or home-like conditions.
Under such circumstances, it would not be too bad an idea to put together a probable playing eleven and over all a sixteen member squad for the mega event, going by the current form of our players. There are certain players who would walk into the side by their sheer class; there are a few who would do so by form, and at least one that I can think of by his name.
We would go by batting positions as that would give us a chance to evaluate each of the players as per the requirement of the order in which he would most probably play.







In my opinion, the best man for the job out of the limited options that we currently have could have been Irfan Pathan, who could have provided the much needed fifth bowler option and a more than useful lower order bat, who had the ability to handle the pressure of international cricket. By not selecting him, we are not only demoralizing him, also doing tremendous injustice to Indian cricket.
Since due to some inexplicable reasons Irfan can’t be picked in the side, we must pick his brother Yusuf Pathan in this slot, as we are playing the world cup in India, where the conditions are going to suit his kind of stroke play, and this powerful striker has the ability to clear any ground on his day. Also, Yusuf does provide the option of batting a bit up in the order when spinners are operating. He can even chip in with a few overs to fill in that fifth bowler’s slot, doing almost a similar job with the ball as Jadeja does. To be fair to him, he has not been given a decent run in the side, considering the complexities that come with the role.
More than anything else, he is a far better choice over the can’t-bat-can’t-bowl Ravindra Jadeja.
Number Eight: This position goes to the most experienced spinner of India, Harbhajan Singh. He has hardly done anything great of late, but experience can’t be ignored. And we don’t have too many choices as well. The only competition you can think of for this sardar is Ashwin, who can also be a decent batsman, but when the stage is as big as the world cup, your number one spinner has to be there in your side. Guys like Piyush Chawala don't even come close to be in a second string side, so Harbhajan make it in our team by the sheer strength of his experience. Harbhajan’s ability with the bat too seals the position in his favor, beyond any kind of doubt whatsoever. Of course, as you are goiug to find later, we shall have Ashwin as a back up for this sole specialist spinner in the side.
Number Nine: Zaheer Khan, one of the best quick bowling options that India has, walks into this position. He is everything that a captain needs as his bowling spearhead. Zaheer bowl with a probing line, provides early break-throughs, contains runs, comes back in a second spell to break partnerships to hand India the advantage. He guides the junior fast bowlers and takes off a lot of responsibility from Dhoni's shoulders. His ability to reverse the old ball comes in handy in Indian conditions. The only thing that has been missing in his armory has been that potent yorker that was his main strenght when he broke into the Indian team as a rookie pacer. But he more than makes up for it with his variation of pace and length. He has been amazing over the past few years and there need not be any debate here.




Number Ten: Ashish Nehra, too, seems to have done enough in the recent past to grab this position, due to his ability and experience. He has been excellent for the past one year or so and it would be really difficult to ignore him. Ever since he started to get back his rythm bowling for the Mumbai Indians, he has pretty much looked the potent bowler of the past. The fact that he was one of our main bowlers alongside Zaheer in the 2003 world cup where India made it to the final, also makes a strong case in his favor. In recent times he has spearheaded the Indian pace attack, whenever Zaheer has been out of the side due to either injury or was given rest to manage work load. Nehra has accepted this challenge and has come out with flying colors.


Number Eleven: We have to choose between Ishant Sharma and Munaf Patel for this position and we would stick to Ishant to start with, more due to the steely resolve that we saw in his character in the recent Mohali Test. He is a handy customer to have, when he is disciplined and this is something he seems to be working on. We have been hearing a lot of positive feed back about Ishant of late, and even if a part of that is close to true, we have a much improved fast bowler in our side. Even otherwise, he is the only one bowler we have who could be called a fast bower in its real sense and it worth a risk to have him. In event of his leaking runs or proving ineffective, we will have back up in Munaf Patel, who could be brought into the side.
That completes the playing eleven. We have seven batsmen and four bowlers in the line-up. As has been seen in the past, the fifth bowler’s quota has to be shared between the part timers. In this eleven, we have Yusuf, Yuvraj, Raina and Sehwag who could share the work load. In spinner friendly conditions of the sub-continent, they should prove more than sufficient for the job.
Having selected the playing eleven, the next task is to select five back up players. That doesn’t look too difficult though. Gautam Gambhir, who could not find a place in the first eleven walks in here in strength of his invaluable experience, whereas Rohit Sharma comes in as a back up to the middle order due to his class. We need to have Dinesh Karthik as the backup for Dhoni, who could also be used as a batsman at any position. A spinner in Ashwin and a medium pacer in Munaf Patel would complete the lineup.
One could notice a couple of important omissions here. Murali Vijay is one such batsman who has performed superbly in the recent past, but Gambhir’s experience and Dinesh’s wicket keeping are too hard to ignore, especially when both these guys can be played as openers. Similarly, Praveen Kumar might look another notable omission, but to me, he is a very hittable bowler in Indian conditions. He is good when the ball does move around, which is rarely the case in India.
Well, that, in my opinion, is arguably the best line up that we can field for the forth coming world cup and I’m sure we are not going to see too many deviations from this list when we do see the actual squad being announced.
We just hope, all of them are fit at the end of the South African series
Hi Sambit, Good Analysis done. These are best Eleven which propably in every body's mind even in our Indian Capitain. There is not much to comment on Top Six, as you rightly mentioned Yusuf is definetly better than Jadeja. I always feel that Yusuf has not got the due credit of chance, people may comment he has not performed / capitalised on the chance provided to him. All the Best for the coming series and for the World Cup. Definetly India have Bright chance of winning the World Cup... Chake de India. Sankara
ReplyDeleteHi Sambit
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on most except I dont think we need 3 pacers in Sub continent . Again keeping out Gambhir is not suggested by me . So take Gambhir in place of Virat Kohli.