Sport - Cricket

Deodhar Trophy: Top players to enliven East versus South encounter

— PHOTO: AFP

GETTING READY: Rahul Dravid snapped during a practice session.

HYDERABAD: For a change, the timing of the Deodhar Trophy, India’s premier domestic limited-overs cricket tournament, is perfect as it is scheduled ahead of the three-Test series against South Africa starting later this month.

The schedule this time has ensured that the big guns from their respective zones are present in the teams and have a chance to get into the groove ahead of the tough and demanding series against the South Africans.

So top players such as Sourav Ganguly (East Zone), and South Zone’s Rahul Dravid, V.V.S. Laxman (both of whom did not figure in the original squad but decided to join their team later), S. Sreesanth and Robin Uthappa will be turning up for the match to be played on Friday at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium (Uppal) here.

There was huge disappointment for the media contingent which descended on the venue in the morning for the East Zone practice session as the team arrived minus Ganguly.

According to team sources, the former India captain was scheduled to arrive late in the evening and would be in the playing eleven.

East Zone captain Laxmi Ratan Shukla is confident of a good showing against host South Zone, which has won the trophy seven times apart from being a joint-winner once with Central Zone.

“Definitely, the presence of Rahul and Laxman should make a world of difference to any team but we are ready for the challenge,” Shukla said. One of the players to watch from East Zone could be southpaw Sourav Tiwari, member of the recent World Cup winning under-19 squad.

South Zone captain S. Badrinath said it was a huge honour to lead a side that had Dravid and Laxman in it. He said that he was not nervous and that the entire team was keen to make the most of the opportunities ahead of the South Africa series. About his own prospects, Badrinath said he had been close to making it to the Indian team for quite a while now.

“And I am keen to come up with a good show to stake my claim. All I need to do is perform, because selection is not in my control. Any team at this level is a competitive side and we have to play to the best of our potential,” he added.

The teams (from): South Zone: S. Badrinath (capt.), V.V.S. Laxman, Rahul Dravid, N. Arjun Yadav, Bharat Chipli, Robin Uthappa, Y. Gnaneshwar Rao, Dinesh Karthik, M. Vijay, Vinay Kumar, S. Sreesanth, Kalyan Krishna, P.M. Sarvesh Kumar, Pragyan Ojha, C. Raghu, Vidyuth Sivaramakrishnan and Sourav Bandekar.

East Zone: L.R. Shukla (capt.), Sourav Ganguly, Anustup Majumdar, Arindam Das, Manoj Tiwary, Ranadeb Bose, Wriddhiman Saha, Shib Shankar Paul, Ireash Saxena, Haladhar Das, P.R. Sinha, Sourav Tiwary, Ishank Jaggi, Manish Vardhan, S.S. Rao, Dheeraj Goswami and S. Purkayasha.

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