Ganguly retained skipper for Zimbabwe series

Expectedly, the national selectors on Wednesday decided to continue with Sourav Ganguly as captain of the Indian cricket team for the home series against Zimbabwe, starting with the first Test at Nagpur on February 21.

Selection committee chairman Chandu Borde told reporters in Mumbai that Ganguly was retained captain as he had done pretty well against England in the recently-concluded series despite his not-so-impressive batting in the Tests, which India won 1-0.

"I think Ganguly did well in the series against England and we decided to give him another chance against Zimbabwe," Borde said.

"However, we discussed two other names, that of Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble, in the 30-minute meeting, but we decided to stick with Ganguly as he has lost just one Test series, against South Africa, in the past 15 months or so," he said.

"Though I am satisfied with his captaincy, I am really not happy with his batting performances in the Tests. Let us only hope he does better against Zimbabwe," Borde added.

Meanwhile, selection committee convenor and Board of Control for Cricket in India secretary Niranjan Shah said the team for the first Test against Zimbabwe would be picked at Delhi on February 17 after the selectors watch the two Ranji Trophy semi-finals, being played at Delhi and Baroda.

Shah said two of the selectors would watch the on-going Ranji Trophy semi-final between Railways and Bengal, at Delhi, while the other three, including the chairman, would watch the Punjab-Baroda encounter.

"However, none of the selectors would watch the crucial Board President's XI versus Zimbabwe tie at Vijayawada due to communication problems," Shah added.

Asked if the board is planning to have two separate captains for Test and one-dayers, as the names of both Dravid and Kumble were discussed, Shah said there is no such plan.

To a question whether Sachin Tendulkar was considered for captaincy, Borde said, "A couple of years ago I asked Tendulkar if he was interested in leading the side but he had said he was not keen as he thought the pressures of captaincy had taken its toll on his batting performance."

Ganguly has led the country in 16 Tests so far, winning seven and losing five with four of them ending in a draw. At home, he has won four Tests out of eight and lost one. Three matches were drawn.

However, his batting has taken a beating after he took over as captain. From 16 Tests (27 innings) he has managed a total of just 650 runs at an average of 28.26, with a highest score of 98 not out.

In one-dayers, he led the team in 57 matches, winning 28 and losing 29. However, he was far more impressive with the bat in the one-dayers, aggregating 2393 runs at an average of 46.92 with 14 fifties and seven hundreds in the 56 innings he has played as captain.

Mail Cricket Editor