India's Top 30 players for the 2011 World Cup

Image via WikipediaHarsha Bhogle has written about the No.7 slot for the Indian team - very valid point about the absence of a proper allrounder (preferably a pace-bowling one) at No.7.
To get an idea of the strategy that might be on the mind of the team management, one has to look at the players who have represented the country at the ODI level in the last year or two - more specifically the list of players who have represented from 1st January 2009 till this year's Independence Day (full list is available here).

Very interesting stats in fact can be seen from this list - one can come up with the long-list of 30 players who will be selected for the World Cup - who are they?

1. Openers - Tendulkar, Sehwag, Gambhir, Dinesh Karthick (reserve wicket-keeper), M Vijay
2. Middle-order - Suresh Raina, Yuvraj Singh, Virat Kohli, Ravinder Jadeja, Yusuf Pathan, Rohit Sharma,
3. Pace bowlers - Zaheer Khan, Ashish Nehra, Ishant Sharma, Praveen Kumar, Sreesanth, Mithun, RP Singh, A Dinda, Munaf Patel, Irfan Pathan, Vinay Kumar, Abhishek Nayar, Jayadev Unadkat
4. Spinners - Harbhajan Singh, Pragyan Ojha, Amit Mishra, R Ashwin, Piyush Chawla
5. Captain and Wicket-keeper - MS Dhoni

It looks like there is not much one can do from now onwards till the World Cup for any new player to be added to the team now.

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