India invest in youth power for England series: Beginning of a new era?

It was a regular afternoon in Chennai with the Chennai Super Kings fans still basking in the last night’s victory against the South African T20 outfit Cape Cobras. A rejuvenated MSD, who got back to winning ways, sat down with the selection committee to decide the Indian squad for the first two ODIs to be played against England in Hyderabad and New Delhi. There were a lot of new faces that made the rounds in the discussion. Mohinder Amarnath, the newest of the selectors was also involved in the discussion.

A 15 member squad was picked for the home series against the world’s best test team. The selectors took a few bold steps in changing the profile and the look of the Indian team. The chosen squad does not feature Sachin Tendulkar,Virender Sehwag,Yuvraj Singh and Zaheer Khan owing to their injuries, while Harbhajan Singh has been left out. It is in snubbing the experienced head, Harbhajan Singh, who is leading the Mumbai Indians in the ongoing CLT20 and is thus clearly not injured, that the selectors have taken one of the boldest steps in recent times. They have dropped Harbhajan owing to his continuous poor showing in the shorter version of the game.

Two players have been called up for national duty for the first time in their careers. Sreenath Aravind, the speedster from Karnataka who represented Royal Challengers Bangalore in the 4th edition of IPL,is one of them. He had a fantastic season with the Bangalore outfit earlier this year and is continuing to have a good season in the CLT20 as well. His consistent performances in the shortest format of the sport have been noticed and he has been given a fair chance to prove that belongs to the international arena. It will be a huge boost to Aravind since he is the only left arm seamer in the 15-member squad and has thus been entrusted with providing variety to the attack.

The other new face who earned a call up is Rahul Sharma, an extremely talented lanky leg-spinner who represented Pune Warriors in the IPL 2011. He was one of the leading wicket takers in the tournament and looked very promising from the very beginning. His economy rate of less than 6 is sure an indicator of the talent this 24-yr old from Jalandhar possesses.

India have retained the young batting brigand of Parthiv Patel, Ajinjya Rahane,Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina, all of whom played in the disastrous tour to England. Kohli proved his mettle with a fantastic century in the final ODI, but Raina will look to this series as the opportunity to silence his critics. Patel and Rahane played really well in England and it will be interesting to see how India would accommodate these two in the playing XI, given that Gautam Gambhir has returned to the squad after recovering from the concussion that made him abandon his English tour. Manoj Tiwary continues to hold his place in the side despite not putting up a great show in England. It would be unfair to judge him just on his performance in England alone given that he faced only a couple of balls and did not get to take the field in other matches.

The seam bowling department has gone through a whale of changes with only Praveen Kumar and Vinay Kumar retained from the previous tour. Though Varun Aaron was also part of the party in the United Kingdom, he never got a chance to showcase his talent. He, along with Umesh Yadav and Aravind, complete the list of pace bowlers.

Ravindra Jadeja has retained his place as the main all-rounders’ slot after a decent showing in England. Ravichandran Ashwin, who has a fantastic rapport with Dhoni, has been retained as the main spinner in the team. He has the ability to develop into a successful bowling all rounder and that would enable him to cement his side, even if Harbhajan Singh returns to the mix. Rahul Sharma will fill the spot of the 2nd specialist spinner in the squad and might get a look in on the slower Indian tracks.

On the whole, this new Indian side looks to bring a fresh lease of life onto the field. The young lot would be more than a handful on the pitches in India. The selection shows the selectors’ faith in the youth and confidence that the players would be able to challenge England ably. It will be a great series given that India would be motivated for revenge. MS Dhoni, who has come under the scanner after the miserable England tour, will look to prove with youth power that he has not lost his midas touch. One should expect all of the 15 to get a chance to play on the field since most of them could well go on to play in their first ever World Cup in 2015 for their country.

Squad: MS Dhoni (capt and WK), Gautam Gambhir, Parthiv Patel, Ajinkya Rahane, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja, R Ashwin, Varun Aaron, Umesh Yadav, Vinay Kumar, S Aravind, Rahul Sharma, Manoj Tiwary, Praveen Kumar.