India-Australia ODI series - Second-hand treatment

The India-Australia ODI series are scheduled to start tomorrow at Kochi. The series has been given a second-hand treatment by both teams by resting several of their main players. Australia started the trend by resting their captain and key players like Johnson, Watson. India reciprocated by resting most of their senior players (Sehwag, Harbhajan, Zaheer).


One can look at in contrasting styles - this will give India a good chance to look at alternates for their open slots (all-rounder, second spinner, reserve pace bowler, reserve batsmen). The one whom everyone will be looking out for will be Ashwin, who had a wonderful T20 season with CSK. Ravinder Jadeja will have a last chance to seal his slot with a good performance.

But, there is another school of thought which says that the full-strength Indian team has not played for a long time now. Sachin Tendulkar last played in ODIs when he scored his world-record 200. Probably, the selectors are expecting the team to be played in South Africa later this year. Whatever the strategy is, there is no doubting the calibre of MSD and Gary Kirsten - the proof of their work is visible for everyone in test matches.

The matches are held at 3 coastal cities - Kochi, Vizag and Goa. With inclement weather likely, one wonders whether there will be any match tomorrow. The latter matches should give us some interesting cricket to witness. Let us hope the ODI series is at least half as exciting as the test series.