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Ganguly included in tests

Pratters

Cricket, Lovely Cricket
The team selection was transferred to today when it was to be held a few days later. It was reported that it was done to select Ganguly in the test team prior to the Eden one dayer to calm the fans of Ganguly and let the match proceed peacefully.

In breaking news, Ganguly has been included in the team for the tests.

:dry:
 

Jono

Virat Kohli (c)
They appointed Dravid as captain of the test series. So he's going to be in the test squad and not be captain? Selecting Ganguly in tests and not ODIs seems so incredibly stupid.
 

Prince EWS

Global Moderator
From Cricinfo:

Sourav Ganguly has been included in the Indian squad for the first Test against Sri Lanka in Chennai. The selectors decided that he had done well as an allrounder recently and chose to pick him as a bowling allrounder. Mahendra Singh Dhoni has replaced Dinesh Karthik as the wicketkeeper.
Excuse me? Bowling allrounder?
 

irfan

State Captain
yea wtf a BOWLING ALLROUNDER! totally degrades that genre of player. flintoff must be fuming....
 

Jono

Virat Kohli (c)
Haha yes. My mate and I were laughing about this a few days back. How Ganguly is ready to play "any role" in the team. Yeah let's open the bowling with him again.

I've even taken it upon myself to mimic Ganguly's superb bowling in the nets. His military mediums are second to none.

But seriously, with all the joking we did we didn't think he'd really be selected for his bowling abilities. 8-)
 

C_C

International Captain
Jono said:
Haha yes. My mate and I were laughing about this a few days back. How Ganguly is ready to play "any role" in the team. Yeah let's open the bowling with him again.

I've even taken it upon myself to mimic Ganguly's superb bowling in the nets. His military mediums are second to none.

But seriously, with all the joking we did we didn't think he'd really be selected for his bowling abilities. 8-)

If Gangoo is a bowling allrounder, i am a tightrope ballerina.
 

SJS

Hall of Fame Member
No surprise whatsoever. Deeply saddened though.

Ganguly should have been included if as and when the situation demanded, continuous failure by one of the three middle order batsmen mentioned, for example but not in this surreptitious way. But as I said the surprise would have been if the selectors had shown they had ba*** and dropped him. Too much to expect of More and other lackeys of Dalmiya.

What are they going to do drop either Kaif or Yuvraj (or Laxman God forbid) or play a bowler less ??

Make Ganguly the 12th man (not justified by his fielding), make him warm the bench ?

Will Dravid be allowed to select an eleven of his choice as is his prerogative ?

Messy indeed !
 

shaka

International Regular
I was shocked to see "done well as an allrounder recently and chose to pick him as a bowling allrounder" and Ganguly in the same article.
 

Jono

Virat Kohli (c)
SJS said:
No surprise whatsoever. Deeply saddened though.

Ganguly should have been included if as and when the situation demanded, continuous failure by one of the three middle order batsmen mentioned, for example but not in this surreptitious way. But as I said the surprise would have been if the selectors had shown they had ba*** and dropped him. Too much to expect of More and other lackeys of Dalmiya.

What are they going to do drop either Kaif or Yuvraj (or Laxman God forbid) or play a bowler less ??

Make Ganguly the 12th man (not justified by his fielding), make him warm the bench ?

Will Dravid be allowed to select an eleven of his choice as is his prerogative ?

Messy indeed !
I'm almost positive Ganguly will steal Kaif of Yuvraj's place in the team. But if he is selected in place of Laxman, I'm not sure what I'll do, but it won't be pretty.
 

SJS

Hall of Fame Member
Rahul Dravid (captain), Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Sachin Tendulkar, V V S Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, Mohammed Kaif, Sourav Ganguly, Irfan Pathan, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Ajit Agarkar, Murali Karthik, Rudra Pratap Singh, Anil Kumble, Harbhajan Singh.

This is the team. Notice it is 15 not 14 !

So lets try to go by process of elimination.

1. Only one out of Karthik/Kumble and one out of Agarkar/RP Singh plays.

We are left with 13.
- Two openers, (Sehwag , Gambhir)
- six middle order batsmen, (Dravid, Tendulkar + four)
- four bowlers (Pathan, Harbhajan and the above two)
- wicket keeper (Dhoni)

We still need to drop two more.

2. So if Ganguly has to find a place, we have to drop two out of three middle order batsmen in Laxman, Yuvraj and Kaif !!

No Jono, it wont be just dropping either Yuvraj or Kaif (if not Laxman) it will have to be both (or one of them plus Laxman) !!

So much for encouraging young talent !!

And this when we are playing four bowlers !

It will be interesting to see how they will get out of this one. Maybe, Ganguly will volunteer to open the innings and Gambhir will be axed !!

Dravid's character is going to be on test !
 

Pratters

Cricket, Lovely Cricket
SJS said:
And this when we are playing four bowlers !
4 bowlers and Ganguly as the 5th bowling all rounder - India's answer to Flintoff of course!

Yes that would a similar situation like we faced earlier with the Indian test team of Yuvraj and Kaif both omitted or some one having to open.

It would be quite shocking to see Laxman out of the test team.
 

SJS

Hall of Fame Member
Pratyush said:
It would be quite shocking to see Laxman out of the test team.
Yes. Not just shocking. Grave injustice. Forget the shamesss Dalmiyas, Mahindras and More's, how will Dravid face himself in the mirror if he does that !!

I am recalling every sentence of our talk the other day. This is just the problem of 'forcibly' putting someone in a team which is doing well and where all others are performing.
 
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Prince EWS

Global Moderator
Cricinfo has changed their article now that the full squad has been named, referring to Ganguly as a batting allrounder.

It still makes little sence to me - I cant see his bowling being anything more than part-time at best.
 

SJS

Hall of Fame Member
Ganguly excercised complete autonomy in selecting his teams and whether one agreed with him or not, his backing of certain players, Parthiv, Dasgupta etc (and non-inclusion of Murali Karthik) clearly showed he would do his own thing in selecting the final side.

Lets see if Dravid is as firm a leader of his boys as Ganguly was. This is really a test of Dravid's stature as India's true leader. Ganguly earned a name for himself for defying and denying past practices in team selection. Lets see if Dravid is man enough !

No one will be able to challenge him if he does, he just needs to find the steel in himself to do it.
 

Pratters

Cricket, Lovely Cricket
Apparently Ganguly is India's version of A.Symonds then.

The thing is he ignored himself as a bowler for so long while he was captain and suddenly started bowling in FC cricket after the Chappell-Ganguly crisis. And he made a statement that he is bowling well taking 14-15 wickets when he had taken fewer (which some one on the forum pointed out).
 
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