Okay . Here is my take.
Openers :
We have five openers in the fray. Sehwag, Gambhir and Vijay for India - Hayden and Katich for Australia
I think Sehwag and Gambhir select themselves on the strength of their performances throughout this year. Vijay is not in this league yet. So I have to chose between Hayden and Katich for the third spot.
Inspite of his poor form for most of this series, Hayden is too classy a player and Katich's revival as opener is too recent and of short duration for me to prefer Katich over Hayden. Not today. Another series with Hayden failing and Katich continuing to perform - then maybe.
So my openers are
1. Sehwag
2, Gambhir
3. Hayden
Middle Order
For the middle order we have
- Tendulkar
- Dravid
- Laxman
- Ganguly
- Ponting
- Hussey
- Clarke
I consider Dravid and Clarke as not good enough on form and Tendulkar, Laxman, Ponting and Tandulkar, Laxman, Hussey and Ponting (too good a player for me to worry about what happened in this series - where too he had a moment or two) as automatic selections.
Ganguly, I believe was more driven by his sense of history in this series than great form. I am absolutely convinced he has done himself a favour by retiring now. His fielding too goes against him But I will come back to him if we have a vacancy in the squad. So we have ...
4. Tendulkar
5. Ponting
6. Hussey
7. Laxman
Wicketkeeper
I dont think the wicket keeping slot is so clearly Dhoni's as is being proclaimed here (at least going by the selections) I consider Haddin a better keeper by a margin. Though Dhoni is by far the better batsman. I am going for Dhoni because I consider him the best captain for the side. I dont think much of Ponting as a captain and though I rate Sehwag, I think Dhoni has done enough for longer time to push his claim ahead. So Dhoni is our wicket keeper and Sehwag the Vice Captain.
8. Dhoni (keeper/captain)
We have just Watson for a conventional all rounder and if we want to add another (since he wont fit in the regular spinners category) I would take White. Of course, one could argue the case for Sehwag being considered as an allrounder too for surely his case is much stronger than Whites. But we wont go there at this time.
So my selection for all rounder is Watson but I will not pen him in yet till I am finished with the bowling side.
Spinners :-
We have four candidates. Kumble, Harbhajan, Mishra and Krejza. I think Kumble is finished and his injury in the third Test saved him and the Indian selectors from some awkward time before the final Test and surely before the next series as well. Harbhajan and Mishra select themselves - one on his record and the other on the fact that he is the only spinner in the squad who makes the ball go away from the right hander. Krejza did well but is not yet ready for this level.
9. Harbhajan
10. Mishra
Pacers
Then we come to the more difficult part - the pace bowlers. The candidates are : Lee, Clark, Johnson, Watson, Siddle, Ishant and Zaheer.
Ishant, Zaheer and Lee select themselves irrespective of Lee's bowling in the series. Like Ponting, maybe to a lesser degree, he is too good a player to be left out on this one show.
Siddle is out and so I believe is Johnson, who despite his speed was very inconsistent and seems to be going downhill. I hope I am wrong but I was amazed at his lack of seam positioning.
I think Stuart Clark is too good a bowler and was badly handled in the series. I would take him too and also Watson who bowled better than all Australian pacers in the series. Taking Watson gives me the second all rounder besides Dhoni but I am really taking him as my fourth pacer in the squad.
11. Lee
12. Ishant
13. Zaheer
14. Watson
15. Clark.
If I have to chose a squad of 16, as I originally planned, I would take another batsman and for me the choice is between Ganguly, Clarke and Katich. On current form the choice should be Katich (he can and has played in the middle order) but Clarke too is a very fine batsman who bowls left arm spin and is an exceptional fielder.
Its a tough one so I will sleep over it.
16. Katich/Clarke
....continued