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Champions Trophy: Who will Patil and gang bet on?

My appetite for ODI cricket has gone down in recent times and (as I wrote here), now that a certain little man won't be opening the innings in his #99 jersey I'll find it harder to tune in.

Nevertheless, the upcoming Champions Trophy is going to be an interesting one because its so open. With Australia, India, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan (who between them have contested all the 50 over World Cup finals since 1996) all in transitional periods, South Africa and England will probably be marginal favourites. And if that in itself is unusual for a limited overs tournament, the fact that the Kiwis are always competitive and the West Indies are the current world T20 champions means that the ICC couldn't have hoped for a better run-up to the next World Cup.

As the squads start to be announced, I'm going to indulge in a bit of playing selector and picking what I think the Indian squad should be. The fact that Sehwag, Harbhajan, and Zaheer didn't make it to the 30 probables makes its a bit harder given those were three I would have pruned from the list! Seriously though, its good to see Patil and co bite the bullet on them and go with younger players and lets hope they do that when the announce the final 15. For now, I am doing that and the first thing to nail down is the composition. Given that the tournament is in England in June, I would look to keep a little more depth in the batting (which is the Indian way as it is) and the quick bowling (much harder given the pool). One wicketkeeper is sufficient given the short nature of the tournament and Dhoni's fitness standards. So my mix would be seven specialist batsmen, one wicketkeeper, five seamers, and two spinners. Picking openers is a bit tricky but I'm going to be courageous and go for Shikhar Dhawan and Ajinkya Rahane as my first choice pair with M Vijay as back up. I like a left-right combination at the top and Rahane's success on the last trip to England edges him ahead of Vijay. For the rest, Virat Kohli,  Suresh Raina, and Rohit Sharma pick themselves as the young triumvirate of Indian limited overs batting. For the last batting slot, I'm going to be bold and pick Dinesh Karthik ahead of Yuvraj and Tiwary. I firmly believe that a post-cancer Yuvraj is now way past his best and doesn't have a future in the Indian team in any format (no room for sentiment here). Tiwary hasn't got too many chances so a bit harsh on him but I've always been a bigger fan of Karthik's adaptability and strokeplay and he also acts as cover for Dhoni if needed. In terms of the bowling, the spinners are the easier bit with Ashwin and Jadeja being firmly ahead of the pack for now. Bhuvneshwar, Ishant, and Shami Ahmed have also done enough in the last few ODIs India played to slot in and a fit again Umesh Yadav is an automatic selection too. That leaves one seamer's slot and for that I will plump for Irfan Pathan. His left arm angle adds variety to the attack especially given that in Bhuvneshwar and Shami there are already (potentially) superior versions of Praveen Kumar and Vinay Kumar.

So there you have it, that's the fifteen who I think have the best chance of bringing home the trophy for India. For what its worth, my first XI would be (in batting order): Dhawan, Rahane, Kohli, Rohit, Raina, Dhoni, Jadeja, Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar, Ishant, and Yadav. India's first two games are at Cardiff and the Oval against South Africa and the West Indies respectively and on those tracks (and against those teams), two spinners is the way to go. For the Pakistan game, I might consider bringing in Irfan instead of Jadeja but that call can be made later. Predictions, predictions, now lets see how the real thing goes.

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