I donot fully agree with your views expressed. First of all opening should be done by Akash Chopra & Ganguly. Somehow we are afraid to drop Laxman ! Why? Shewag should take the place of Laxman as he is useful not only as a batsman but also as a bowler. Why are we afraid to include five specialist bowlers ? I think the only one who comes to mind is Ramesh Powar or Murali Kartik.
Fitness alone cannot fit Ganguly to play the third test. If you could look in to the Ganguly past One day as well as test performance. It was not satisfying with the captains knock. I would suggest that Ganguly can take a rest for this test and get fully recovered from the injury and comeback with his potential with future tests. At this juncture you cannot drop Akash Chopra just for not scoring big runs. Even Laxman didnt perform well in one dayers but he came back well in the Final for the crucial win.Akash has stood well with Veeru, as an opener you need to stand to give a good partnership. In that sense Akash is doing great and he cannot be dropped by simple reason for our skipper coming in. This is a Team Game and hope our Indian team will not let down this young lad.
It is a good sign that Indian batting is so strong now that even including a seasoned pro like Saurav is becoming a problem. Its unfortunate that Akash Chopra who has done reasonably well in the past has to sit out to accomodate the captain. This happened due to the excellent performance of Yuvraj Singh who grabbed the oportunity given to him due to Sourav's absense.
I firmly believe that Saurav should bat at his regular spot due to 2 reasons 1. He is not at the best of form and his best chance to recover form is lower down the order. 2.Parthiv Patel, who has a compact technique should open the innings. The people who did well in their respective positions should continue.
So instead of resorting to unnecessary heroics, let the captain bat where he is most comfortable and most likely to regain his lost form
I don't know what you have against ganguly but you seem to be the first one to criticize him when the team looses and the last one to acknowledge his importance when the team wins. Saying that Ganguly should open the innings to show that he wants to "lead by example" or to show his "leadership" like you said is obtuse. Why on earth would one want to change such a nice batting order. Even though, the team did not play to its strengths, I think that it was the umpiring that cost us the game. Just my opinion.
