Ganguly should not open, we should save him to tackle Murli and other slow bowlers later.
If you have obserevd Ind-lanka matches, Ganguly is one person who has handled Murli really wel, i think he is the most comfortable of all indian bastmen against him. And also, you dont want to expose him against one of the best fast bowlers in the world, thats not ganguly's strengths anyways. If ganguly opens Vaas will most likely knock him early.
Agarkar should seriously take a break.
Pathan opening ? He certainly has the batting technique to handle(read defend) quality fast bowling. He has opened for india in the past and has not dissapounted. Further it would be a sort of surpise element to the opposition, who right now must be making plans to knock Dada,Sehwag etc early on .
If Uthappa fails early, Sehwag should step in, else Dravid. If we dont lose early wickets and caryon with good pace, then he should get back to number 6-7 and come later.
Why Uthhapa still in team despite failures off late? Well Uthappa is almost a sehwag like player, chances that these guys click are usually less but when they do its almost game over for the opposition. And thats why you tempted to keep them both, hoping either of them clicks...
Playing spin is not yuvi's forte. He would be vulnerable to murli, will typically go for that high risk sweep, and end up top edging to the wrong one. So our game plan should be letting him play murli as less as possible. so when he comes to bat should be timed well. We dont want him to play entire quota of murli.
kumble is certainly a better bet than bhaji considering very recent form, but then Srilanka have lot of left handers, and so bhaji's off spin will help.
