The NKP Challenger Trophy has come to an end and a team called India Blue have won the title. What this means to the team or any of the players is anybody’s guess. This is because the selection committee has a mind of its own. The Challenger Trophy was started by the Indian Cricket Board in the late nineties to provide a platform for the best players in the domestic scene to showcase their talent against the senior team. But like all other initiatives taken by the board (including the National Cricket Academy and the Pitches Committee) the Challenger trophy has been descended into mediocrity and threatens to stay there.
Unnecessarily Rested:
What was the need to rest somebody like Rahul Dravid? He has been in very poor form of late and this could have been a great opportunity for Dravid to get some runs under his belt. Instead he has now been dropped sorry rested from the national squad putting a big dent on his confidence. Forget Rahul Dravid, what about the rest of the first team? Barring a few (such as Dhoni) not all the players have been playing every single game over the past few months.The only problem is that there is a world of difference when Dinesh Karthik or a Gautham Gambhir scores a century against a line up of Sreesanth, Zaheer and Pathan or somebody like Praveen Kumar bowls an impressive spell to Tendulkar or Dravid. You know then the men deserve a place in the national squad.
Raw Deal:
Surely S Badrinath must be wondering what he must to do to win a spot in the final XI. And when he DOES get that spot, expect him to walk in at either 54/5 or with 2 overs to go, not make too much runs and promptly be dropped for the next game. He did make the squad for the final one-dayer (dead rubber) against Australia and yet wasn’t played.Worse, as Prem Panicker points out, our chairman of selectors Dilip Vengsarkar believes that Gautham Gambhir is a middle-order batsman and Rohit Sharma (who is incidentally IN the team) is waiting in the wings! Another couple of years in the fringes and Badrinath will probably find his career going the way of state teammate S. Sharath (tons of runs at the domestic level but no interest shown by the selectors)
And what has Virendra Sehwag done to get back into the national squad? I always believed that his best position is right at the top and yet chances are its going to Tendulkar and Ganguly who are going to be opening the innings. In his three innings in the Challenger Trophy he made 1, 75 and 9. Compare that to Raina (92,64, 50) or Badrinath (41,82, and 55) and Vengsarkar’s assertion that the selection is made on form and fitness makes absolutely no sense.
![[del.icio.us]](http://images.del.icio.us/static/img/delicious.small.gif){kind=small}
