Should Sehwag be included in Indian squad for the WC?

It's a million dollar question..isn't it? My answer to that question is a strong "YES". I know many of you will disagree after seeing the recent debacle in his batting form...but here are few reasons why I want Sehwag to be in the Indian side which will fly to WI for the prized trophy in cricket world.

• He is one of the most prolific batsmen in International Cricket today with career strike rate of 95.
  
• He can take down any bowling attack which is very important against sides like Australia and SA.
  
• He is a handy part time spinner.
• He is probably the best fielder among the seniors.
• He can be unconventional with his field placings.
• There is nobody to replace him in the Indian bench. Uthappa is a handy player but largely untested against better opposition and on bowler friendly pitches. But, we should still take him to WI as cover. Australia has the luxury of strong bench strength. Their A teams are as good as many international sides today. It always keeps their senior players on toes. India, and for that sake many international sides lack that.
  
• India needs experience in WI. Sehwag, Tendulkar, Ganguly and Dravid contribute almost 40,000 ODI runs and more than 700 matches.
• I just think he is far important player to be dropped for a tournament like the World Cup.
• All these reasons are from the perspective of the World Cup. In the long term(which I think should not be considered right now), if he keeps on failing, he will be automatically dropped.
  

Sehwag should have been dropped for the test matches against SA like the way Pathan was. That could have given him more time to work on his batting. Anyway, I just hope he has worked on his batting with his childhood coach to regain that lost confidence in whatever break he got and we will get to see that old Destructive Sehwag against Sri Lanka and also in WI.

The best cricket pitch in India

Which is the best cricket wicket in India of all the test centers? I am sure the answer to this is going to be almost unanimous amongst all readers.

For the less informed who don't know the list of test centers:

• Feroz Shah Kotla, Delhi
• PCA Stadium, Mohali
• Green Park, Kanpur
• Eden Gardens, Kolkata
• Sardar Patel Stadium, Ahemdabad
• Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai
• Vidharbha Cricket Association Stadium, Nagpur
• Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore
• Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai

So, which one is your pick? I am sure most are going to pick the second entry in that list. The beautiful and picturesque stadium at Mohali with a pitch that came in for praise from all quarters after the Champions Trophy late last year.

What makes this pitch so special? It is the pace, the bounce and the lateral movement, I guess. That surely makes this pitch the favorite of every foreign team landing in the subcontinent expecting to see some square turners. In the recently concluded Champions Trophy, decent fast bowling teams troubled batsmen time and again on this pitch. It was a lot of fun watching batsmen at the receiving end for once. The large size of the ground also deterred the batsmen from going for the big hit.

But what about teams that don't have fast bowlers to extract bounce and seam movement from this pitch? What about teams that rely more on turn to take wickets? What about teams that rely more on inducing an error from the batsman by making him go for a big hit? At the same time, what about batting sides that can play well against a turning ball, but not so well against bounce? Teams that are good at hitting boundries, and no so much at running runs. Is it still the best pitch for this team? It isn't!

So this pitch is going to ruthlessly expose the weaknesses of teams like Sri Lanka and India (nothing wrong about that), but at the same time hide the weaknesses of teams like New Zealand, South Africa, Australia and England (wrong, wrong, wrong). A team loaded with just fast men can do well at this venue. A team loaded with spinners has no chance in hell of winning a test match here.

'So are you saying this is not the best pitch in India?'

'Yes'

'So which is?'

It is the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai.

'How so?'

The pitch at Wankhede offers assitance to both kinds of bowlers. The first session of each day always is extremely exciting for the seam bowlers. The pitch invariably has a lot of bounce (I have seen Gilchrist collecting the ball consistently at chest or above off the bowling of McGrath and Gillespie), a lot of swing and seam movement (due to the proximity to the sea) and always has a lot of turn. Add to this the fact that the size of the outfield is on the smaller side. This gives the batsman an option to counter-attack (I was privileged to see the best counter-attack on Indian soil in recent times by Adam Gilchrist at this ground).

So a team like India or Sri Lanka can hope to keep the runs down early on and let loose their trump cards in the afternoon session, and teams like Australia and South Africa can hope to run through the top order in the first session. Batsmen need to be adept at handling both the faster and the slower men to score big at the ground.

How many dull draws have we seen at this ground? And how many have we seen at Mohali?

There are many pitches in India that offer assistance to the slower men. Mohali offers more help to the seamers. But only Wankhede has the right blend of seam and spin.