***Official*** India in Australia

[Jono]

Don't get me wrong, I understand what you're saying, but do you really want to debut a new opener against Australia in Australia?

Karthik and Jaffer delivered in England, often when batting conditions were tough at various points. Can't ask for much more.

 

[pasag]

Yeah, Karthik and Jaffer won the series for India in that second Test with that 150 run partnership, changing the openers now would be silly, imo.

 

[Manee]

Yeah, Karthik and Jaffer won the series for India in that second Test with that 150 run partnership, changing the openers now would be silly, imo.

Ok, fair enough. I was going along the thought pattern that he is far too inconsistant and that over half of his innings in Test cricket have been below 15, a quite staggering stat. If you lose an early wicket against Australia, they will smell blood and go for the kill and more often than not succeed in bowling a team out cheaply.

Against the most experienced middle order in world cricket, the only weakness is the new ball (hence they are best in the middle) and you need an opener who can consistantly play out the new ball or else one with a high enough average (Sehwag?) to account for the odd low score. Jaffer is neither of these.

 

[jeevan]

Jaffer & Karthik did great the one chance they got in SA too. They may be as good as Chopra & Sehwag, Jaffer is all or nothing type, but even a couple of alls will be good too.

Key for India are the seamers keeping it together.
In Australia the last time around, Agarkar did well especially the one match-clinching spell. Need a pacer to really really step up, Sreesanth is a candidate and Zaheer is bowling well too.

(Trying hard to make myself think that this Indian team are more than lambs to the slaughter, not withstanding the fact that the last one did pretty well)

 

[Manee]

Jaffer & Karthik did great the one chance they got in SA too. They may be as good as Chopra & Sehwag, Jaffer is all or nothing type, but even a couple of alls will be good too.

The Chopra and Sehwag combination was not as good as hyped otherwise Chopra would not have been dropped and furthermore, Chopra and Sehwag would open for Delhi.

 

[jeevan]

The Chopra and Sehwag combination was not as good as hyped otherwise Chopra would not have been dropped and furthermore, Chopra and Sehwag would open for Delhi.

Agreed, but for that one series they delivered good starts despite their limitations. I hope Wasim & Karthik are able to do the same for this series, is what I meant.

 

[adharcric]

Jaffer and Karthik should go with Chopra as reserve. For Pakistan, Sehwag will probably end up making the squad somehow. Let's see how that pans out.

 

[Manee]

Jaffer and Karthik should go with Chopra as reserve.

Never! Gambhir has done nothing bad to warrent a drop from the squad. He also has a far better FC average to back him up.

 

[adharcric]

Never! Gambhir has done nothing bad to warrent a drop from the squad. He also has a far better FC average to back him up.

One could argue that he has, actually. He looked completely out of depth against the Aussies in the one-day series. Meanwhile, Chopra has done plenty to warrant a call-up, especially if he fares well in the second round of Ranji Trophy. Either of Jaffer, Karthik, Sehwag, Gambhir or Chopra could end up being good options, but Gambhir should certainly not be ahead of Chopra by any significant margin.

 

[Manee]

One could argue that he has, actually. He looked completely out of depth against the Aussies in the one-day series. Meanwhile, Chopra has done plenty to warrant a call-up, especially if he fares well in the second round of Ranji Trophy. Either of Jaffer, Karthik, Sehwag, Gambhir or Chopra could end up being good options, but Gambhir should certainly not be ahead of Chopra by any significant margin.

But by some margin. 50 cricket has never been Gambhir's forte, four day cricket has. I know you are a fan of Chopra but he will have to score maybe a hundred or a few fifties for Delhi to be considered for selection for Australia.

 

[adharcric]

But by some margin.

Based on what? Twenty20 cricket? Since the (real) WC, he's averaging 24 in one-day cricket against quality opposition (i.e., not BAN, IRE, SCO) - he was averaging 17 coming into this series against Pakistan.

50 cricket has never been Gambhir's forte, four day cricket has.

Yes, I know what his first-class average is. I've also seen him bat against world-class opposition.

I know you are a fan of Chopra but he will have to score maybe a hundred or a few fifties for Delhi to be considered for selection for Australia.

First of all, I've been one of the biggest Gambhir supporters on here and only recently started pushing for Chopra (since Sehwag went down and he started scoring big runs along with his ability to see off the new ball). Did you miss Chopra's recent hundreds? Gambhir may deserve a shot but he's been hyped up way too much lately.

 

[iamdavid]

Think we're going to see plenty of runs this India series, the Sri Lankan attack really was atleast as good if not better than the Indian one will likely be, and to be fair they all bowled pretty well (with the exception of Fernando), yet in both first innings they only got half way through Australia for 500+.

And Sangakarra/Atapattu showed in the Hobart game how easy batting can be in Australian conditions against this attack (particularly if MacGill's off song), India's lineup is full of batsman of a similar calibre to Sangakarra..

Unless India bowl out of their skins and hold ALL their catches I really think they're struggle to force a result...and if the Indian batsman adapt to conditions quickly and play to their potential it may well be the same case for Australia.

 

[gettingbetter]

Will be tough for India to win many if Dravid is as out of form as he has been recently. They need a firing Rahul to win these matches IMO.

Think he is getting back to his best, he's scored 1 or 2 tons in the domestic leagues.

 

[gettingbetter]

Loving the Australia Day Test, I know it probably was impossible, but would of been better had it started on the publich holiday? What day is it BTW?

Whose got 4 months off uni after Monday?

Yes me.

 

[gettingbetter]

For the opening slot, I feel that Virender Sehwag, who has always been a stronger unlimited overs batsman than limited overs batsman will be pushing for a place if he is impressive for Delhi. Gautam Gambhir has performed just as well as Sewhag for Delhi in the past years.

Dinesh has been averaging over 50 since opening, i don't see any reason to drop him yet. While Jaffer is quite on and off, but I think the Pakisatan series will decide who will (hopefully) partner Dinesh.

For the middle order, Subramaniam Badrinath is a fantastically strong contender with 3887 FC runs at 58.01 (not too far behind Dravid or Tendulkar's pure FC averages). Furthermore, Yuvraj Singh cannot be kept away from the Test team much longer. He is the strongest ODI batsman in the team and rarely is your strongest ODI batsman not good in Tests. In his limited time in Tests, he has performed fine and showed no difficiencies with 830 runs at 33.20. This is not to mention Manoj Tiwary who topped the averages in last year's Ranji Trophy at 99.50 off 10 innings and Uthappa who topped the run scorers list with an average over 50!

Tiwary and Uthappa re too young (I don't usually play this card like Richard), but when you have incumbents like Dravid and Tendulkar at 3 and 4, making such sweeping changes seem ludicrous. I wouldn't mind seeing Badrinath in for Ganguly; the Indian team need to make certain changes and something not as volatile as dropping Ganguly could be it.

India cannot afford to stick with the formula who scraped past England. Australia, even post McGrath, Warne and Langer are twice the team that India beat 1-0.

Sehwag
Gambhir
Badrinath
Yuvraj
Tiwary
Uthappa
Dhoni
Munaf
Chawla
bowler
bowler

Doesn't really fill me with confidence. (That is the assumption I make of your team composition after reading your thread)

 

[Dasa]

Tiwary and Uthappa re too young (I don't usually play this card like Richard), but when you have incumbents like Dravid and Tendulkar at 3 and 4, making such sweeping changes seem ludicrous. I wouldn't mind seeing Badrinath in for Ganguly; the Indian team need to make certain changes and something not as volatile as dropping Ganguly could be it.

No way. Ganguly has been in great form in Tests since his comeback. He batted beautifully in England and emerged with very good figures even with some pretty poor decisions against him. I wouldn't think of dropping Ganguly now.

 

[Prince EWS]

Gambhir is nowhere close to being a test standard opener IMO. Yes, I know what his first class average is, but like adharcric, I've seen him bat. He'd get murdered in Australia.

 

[gettingbetter]

No way. Ganguly has been in great form in Tests since his comeback. He batted beautifully in England and emerged with very good figures even with some pretty poor decisions against him. I wouldn't think of dropping Ganguly now.

Fair point, didn't really remember how he went in England.

I posted something similar in the Pak/Ind thread, and it might just be me, but it seems like India have 2 players for every spot (who 'could' do a decent job of it).

Either way, I would find it hard to believe that Badrinath is ahead of Yuvraj in the batting stakes, and if there was to be a change *looked at the England/India scorecards* Yuvraj for Laxman would be it...then you got Laxman's record against Australia...it just keeps going on and on.

Problem: you can find 1 reason for keeping a player and 1 reason for discarding them.

 

[Richard]

Think we're going to see plenty of runs this India series, the Sri Lankan attack really was atleast as good if not better than the Indian one will likely be, and to be fair they all bowled pretty well (with the exception of Fernando), yet in both first innings they only got half way through Australia for 500+.

That had a lot to do, though, with "just the way the cookie crumbled". You can't say they bowled poorly; the nicks just didn't come. There's no more that they could have done, really.

And SL's attack > India's, easily.

 

[silentstriker]

When a man knows he is going to lose, he finds a way to make it happen. As a fan, I can feel that way, but I hope a lot of the younger players are ignorant about the history of teams that tour Australia and go in with a lot of confidence.