Leaving out Inzy is simply unjustified, for me the most horrendous of the selection mistakes....apart from Lara & Dravid he's better than any of the other batsmen selected in the team including Tendulkar at the moment. I tell this being an Indian cricket fan. He's a match winner...different to Lara in style though....bats with more care combined with terrific stroke play. Anyway we all know what all things affect these selection process...driven more by glamour than cricketing abilities.
Everyone knows that VVS Laxman has been Australia's bugbear for sometime now, even the Australians acknowledge this fact. Its strange as pointed out by this article that the guys who did well had to cede their places to people like Smith, Afridi and Sehwag.
We thought it was the Indians who are usually accused of populist measures, be iot in cricket or public service. Now, the selectors of the World XI have proved that they too are equally, if not more guilty of the same misdemenours. Otherwise how do you explain Graeme Smith selected over Michael Vaughn after Vaughn's deeds with the bat in the previous Ashes tour or his current form in the last Ashes Test? How do you explain the inclusion of Vettori? Only that Stephen Fleming could not be accomodated so lets get a New Zealander to fill the Quota system. Not much different from the Zonal Selection policy of Indian cricket. Now we can truly claim that India is the centre of gravity of world cricket.
The decision of omitting Inzamam from the World XI team was very disappointing and with no sense. But one thing I can say that this was expecting , beacause Sunil Gavaskar was there for the selection. He will always back his pet boy "Tendulkar" in any cost. I would like to know about the criteria of the team selection. If we take the current ICC Test or One Day rankings Sachin is well behind in the list compare to Inzy.Also in the last 2-3 years Sachin failed to deliver in both forms of the game against weak oppositions also(Exception -Bangldesh). Also He will always bats for his record and other things. One thing I am sure that like the Indian team the world team is also a team filled with superstars who plays for themselves not for the team(Exception - Rahul Dravid). The final result will also the same which happened to Indian team. In what sense Sachin inclued in the ODI team. Did he play any match winning innings in last 2-3 years?.(Infact throughout his career except Sharjah Cup). This selection is fully based on some other criteria. Then about the Captain. How Smith became the captain of the test team?. Did he make any impact in last years in tests?. The players from South A
I Could not agree more ith this article. How else can you explain the ommision of Rahul Dravid and Inzamam from the one day squad.
One thing the selectors seemed to miss out is the recent form apart from performance against Australia.
Dravid would walk into any word XI team based on his shear consistency and performance over the last three years. Well the KING OF SHAWDOWS...is being ignored again. I am sure the GREAT WALL would not crack at this contineous unfairness towards him.
There are good players in the world XI but there are obviously some shocking selection or exclusion. With all due respect to Sachin, as world's best batsman, for his recent form and fitness Dravid should be selected instead of Sachin. And of course Inzy, at least in the test team. Vaas is also another shocking exclusion. Surprised to see his name is not mentioned in this article. Shohaib Akhtar is also included for the same reason as Sachin is named. Australia is not India, so the chance of success for Afridi is quite low. Jayawardana can be included also. And instead of Smitch, Lara would be a better choice for captaincy, probably in both form, test and OD.
RE:my team
by rahul singh on Aug 27, 2005 02:30 AM
very funny, tell me if anybody in ur test squad is a speciallist opener. my friend u need to see which foot fills the proper boot.
To be honest I am surprised as to why Harbajan and Inzamam been overlooked by the selectors. Because if they are looking at last years record then Inzamam deserves to be in the team whereas if they feel the record against Australians count then Harbajan should be in the team !!! I feel Harbajan, Kumble and Kaneria are better spinners then Vettori and if they really needed a left arm spinner then just look at the Ashes and you can see that Giles has performed quite well against Aussies :)
Sunil Gavaskar as always pleased the GORAS by nodding and choosing the GORA crowd in the team instead of selecting the team on merit, on which people like Inzamam, Dravid, Harbajan and others should have been selected.
My goodness, i cannot imagine Grame smith to be the cap....inzamam out of play and so is rahul dravid. The selectors im sure must have had a tough time, but then players of such calibre should not be left out. This is absolutely mind boggling....as zaheer abbas and javed mianded commented. Sunil gavaskarji sun raheho....aap
