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Delhi?s day of wisdom dawns
On Wednesday and Thursday, we'll have the revelation. At least that's what the Delhi selectors would have the rest of the world believe.
On Wednesday and Thursday, we'll have the revelation. At least that's what the Delhi selectors would have the rest of the world believe. After having made Delhi the laughing stock of anyone who's watching the DDCA's doings by declaring a "probables" list of 30 for the Ranji one-dayers a few days ago, while other states are busy fine-tuning their squads ahead of the season-ending games, the selectors will spend the next two days watching the bunch to choose their "team of the century".
One, presumably, the selectors hope will wash away the sins of the Ranji Trophy season, which Delhi passed through with the sword of relegation hanging over their heads from Games 1 to 7. So on Tuesday, a day made notable because all the various suits (read DDCA officials never seen other than when dressed up to greet some important personage) were present to lead DDCA president Arun Jaitley into the Kotla stadium, the selectors made their move. They divided the said probables into groups of two, one mostly made of players who have a chance of making the actual squad for the first two games, led by Delhi skipper Mitthun Manhas. The other, with one or two exceptions, is mostly made up of players who are either very young, very inexperienced or players they reportedly want to "expose" as being unfit for selection at this level.
The reasoning might be sound but the move is utterly shameful simply because if the players need to be "exposed", then why on earth are they in the Ranji camp in the first place? Only one reason. The selectors, as a collective group, are too scared of various "pulls" and "pressures" to keep certain "influential" players out on their own.
They're simply hoping that these players will mess up in the coming two practice games and they can justify their non-inclusion. This, of course, is a dangerous move. What happens if one of these so-called "faltoo" players, hits a 30-40 or grabs three wickets? Well, maybe that's what people are hoping for. Manhas, who will have to shut out outside interference as much as possible if he wants Delhi to get ahead in these one-dayers, will be looking to get his players some valuable practice. Most of them would be on a low following the unhappy days games season and he would well know that a good performance in the one-dayers can go a long way in lifting the mood ahead of next year.
Aakash Chopra has been given the doubtful honour of leading the second team. He can probably take solace in the fact that no one with even a passing knowledge of Delhi cricket will be expecting miracles from him or the team. As some senior player had to lead -- and there's really only Manhas, Amit Bhandari and him to choose from --- he now has this probably unwanted joy. Let's see what the morrow brings.
Ranji one-day probables (practice games teams) Team 1: Mitthun Manhas (c), Amit Bhandari, Rajat Bhatia, Puneet Bisht (wk), Joginder Singh, Sarandeep Singh, Chetanya Nanda, Yogesh Sachdeva, Kuunal Lall, Ishant Sharma, NS Negi, Abhinav Bali, Kuldeep Rawat, Ashish Malhotra and Gaurav Chhabra
Team 2: Aakash Chopra (c), Virat Kohli, Rajinder Bisht (wk), Mohit Sharma, Wilkins Victor, Suhail Sharma, Pradeep Sangwan, Mukesh Dewan, Harsh Gautam, Hanish Arora, Abhishek Sharma, Premvir Nagar, Kesar Chaudhary and Navdeep Tomar
