India set to roll on spinning wheel

Chawla the lone surprise choice in 15-man squad

Resisting the temptation to plump for a second reserve batsman in Rohit Sharma, Krishnamachari Srikkanth’s five-man panel has gone for the off-spin of R Ashwin and the leg-spin of Piyush Chawla to supplement principal spinner Harbhajan Singh, though it is unlikely that India will field two specialist spinners in more than just the occasional match.

India have traditionally been comfortable playing the four specialist bowlers and relying on the plethora of spinning options among their top-order batsmen to make up the fifth bowler’s complement of ten overs. With Yusuf Pathan almost certain to make the playing eleven at home, they have an additional one semi-specialist spinning option to fall back on, allowing Mahendra Singh Dhoni to play three seamers in every match.

In having picked only four pacemen, the decision-makers have followed the time-honoured principle of keeping the faith. Successful teams have based their campaigns on a settled, secure playing eleven. Indeed, when India made the final of the 2003 World Cup in South Africa, they used just 12 players in ten matches, the services of Ajit Agarkar, Sanjay Bangar and Parthiv Patel not required at all.

Perhaps occasionally, India will mix and match Zaheer Khan, Praveen Kumar, Ashish Nehra and Munaf Patel and pick three out of four, mainly because the World Cup is a long tournament if you throw in the warm-up games and because most of this quartet is carrying some niggle or the other, but otherwise, unless old injuries resurface with telling effect, the core group will remain unaltered throughout the tournament.

Mumbai middle-order batsman Rohit will perhaps consider himself unlucky to have missed out on selection, but if he is true to himself, he will acknowledge that he hasn’t done enough for the selectors to pencil in his name automatically. The promise he showed at the start of his career hasn’t quite translated itself into a bagful of runs. As recently as last May in Zimbabwe, when he made back-to-back hundreds for a second-string side in a tri-series as the rest of the batting unit floundered, he suggested that he had turned the corner, but subsequent events have shown that that was only the latest false dawn in a career of reasonably disappointing proportions.

Conversely, Chawla must realise that he is the recipient of a lucky break. The 22-year-old leggie hasn’t played a limited-over international for two and a half years now and was recalled only because left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha is nursing a shoulder injury. To make the World Cup side without any recent form to back him up is nothing if not a mini-miracle, and if he feels the pressure to justify his selection, that is well warranted.
Ashwin’s selection is the reward for courage and character. Steadfastly overlooked by Dhoni even when Harbhajan wasn’t a part of the squad, Ashwin came into his own under Gautam Gambhir in the home series against New Zealand late last year. He isn’t the most athletic on the field – how much India’s lethargic, old-worldly approach on the park will hurt them, only time will tell – but his command over his skills, especially in the limited-overs format, is exemplary.

He offers bounce, is a viable option during Power Plays when the field is in, and possesses a versatile bag of tricks including the ‘carrom’ ball. Economy might not be his forte, yet, but he is an attacking bowler unafraid to try and buy wickets. A true rarity in the modern game, and especially so in the limited-overs version.