Irfan Pathan misses out as India announces its preliminary squad for 2011 World Cup
The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) announced its preliminary squad for the 2011 World Cup with the surprise inclusion of Ajinkya Rahane and exclusion of all rounder Irfan Pathan.
Mumbai’s middle order batsman Rahane is the only uncapped cricketer in the 30 man preliminary squad. The selection committee headed by Kris Srikkanth announced four wicketkeepers: MS Dhoni, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Dinesh-c54134 Karthik.
Dhoni has been retained as the Captain of the provisional squad along with veteran players Sachin Tendulkar, and Virendar Sehwag making an appearance in the squad.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Gautam-Gambhir-c58623 also finds a place as he recently led a second string team successfully against New Zealand. Gambhir who was left out of the 2007 World Cup had a long battle at finding his form for limited overs as the exclusion left him “not wanting to play
anymore.”
Cheteshwar Pujara also makes his way into the 30 man probable members’ list. Pujara was one of the new finds of the year 2010 for http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746.
Along with Pujara, Virat Kohli also confirms his place as he successfully unleashed his form this year, performing well under pressure.
He has been picked along with promising leg spinner Piyush Chawla and Yusuf Pathan who worked his magic as an all-rounder in the fourth One Day against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754. His match winning unbeaten 123 runs came off only 96 balls as he took the selectors by surprise.
However, his brother http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Irfan-Pathan-c1601 missed out from the preliminary squad as he has remained out of action due to an injury. Irfan also missed out the initial stages of the Ranji Trophy. The exclusion of Irfan demonstrates the extent to which he has faltered
this season owing to his failing form as well as the amount of young talent excelling this year for the Indian team in all forms of cricket.
Along with Irfan, veteran batsman “The Wall” http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Rahul-c83321 Dravid has also failed to make the cut in the preliminary squad.
The chairman of the selection committee, Srikkanth said that the selection panel made sure that the players work well, considering the sub-continent conditions of the World Cup which is being co-hosted by India along with http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Bangladesh-c747.
“This is a probables team and everyone selects himself. There is one more month to go to select the final team and we will sit down and think calmly before finalising the team,” Srikkanth stated.
The preliminary team will be trimmed to a 15 man squad by January 19th, 2011 considering the ongoing tour of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/South-Africa-c757 where India would be playing their first ODI from January 12th.
India’s preliminary squad: http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Ashish-Nehra-c46293, Sreesanth, Munaf Patel, Ishant
Sharma, Vinay Kumar, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Piyush-c82317 Chawla, Pragyan Ojha.
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