Punjab has edge over Mumbai

Hyderabad: Cricket fans in the city will be treated to top grade excitement for the next nine days when the big boys and those knocking on the doors parade their talent to take centre-stage during the Vijay Hazare Trophy tournament, which will commence on Thursday.

The most closely contested fight will be at Gymkhana when the formidable Mumbai take on previous edition runner-up Punjab to set the ball rolling for the cricketing caravan. The Hyderabad leg of the prestigious One-Day tournament will also include Tamil Nadu, Services, Team Rajasthan, Assam and the host.

On the face of it, Mumbai will start as the underdog as their be without the services of the in-form Feroz Shah Kotla hero Ajinkaya Rahane and one-day specialist Rohit Sharma while Punjab will be fielding its best combination, including Harbhajan Singh, Yuvraj Singh, Gurkreet Singh and Mandeep Singh.

Mumbai chief coach Chandrakant Pandit was rather pragmatic when he contended that internationals can add to one’s strengths and bolster the prospects. “Yes, both Rohit and Rahane will not be available for the first two matches. The presence of internationals will boost the morale in the dressing room,” he said after the team underwent a rigourous practice session at Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium on Wednesday.

He said that the team boasted of young but talented players, who have done well in the Ranji Trophy. “Of course, one-dayers are a different ball game altogether. It will be a good competition and it will be difficult to predict outcomes in the shorter versions given the nature of play,” the former India stumper said.

In the other matches, Ravichandran Ashwin will be leading Tamil Nadu against Assam at RGICS while Team Rajasthan will face Services at RRC Sports Complex. As things appear, Tamil Nadu and Team Rajasthan begin with the marginal advantage over their respective opponents.

Hyderabad will open their campaign against Punjab a day later.

Teams- Mumbai: Aditya Tare (C & Wk), Akhil Herwadkar, Shreyas Iyer, Surya Kumar Yadav, Siddhesh Lad, Jay Vista, Shardul Thakur, Abhishek Raut, Abhishek Nayar, Dhawan Kulkarni, Iqbal Abdullah, Sagar Trivedi, Rohan Raje, Sufiyan Shaikh, Shashank Singh;

Punjab:Yuvraj Singh(C), Harbhajan Singh, Gukeerat Mann, Siddharth Kaul, Uday Kaul, Barinder Singh Saran, Mayank Siddana, Sarabjeet Singh Ladda, Manan Vohra, Jiwanjot Singh, Pargat Singh, Deepak Bansal, Gitansh Khera (Wk), Mandeep Singh, Karan Kaila

Tamil Nadu: Ashwin Crist, Abhinav Mukund, Baba Aparajith, Baba Indrajith, J Koushik, Dinesh Karthik (Wk), L Balaji, M Ashwin, M Mohammed, Murali Vijay, Malolan Rangarajan, R Ashwin (C), R Satish, Rahil S Shah, S Anirudha, Vijay Shankar, W Anthony Dhas;

Assam: Gokul Sharma(C), B Arun Karthik, Syed Mohammed, Amit Verma, Sarupam Purkayastha, Pallav Das, Amit Sinha, Kirshna Das, Arup Das, Abu Nechim Ahmed, Wasiqur Rahman (Wk), Rajdeep Das (Wk), Pritam Das, Bikash Chetri, Sib Sankar Roy, Jogeswar Bhumji

Team Rajasthan: Pankaj Singh (C), Ashok Menaria, Pranay Sharma, Dishanth Yagnik (Wk), Siddhanth Duwal, Nathu Singh, Tanveer, Maninder Singh, Manjeet Chaudhary, Arjit Gupta, Aditya Agarwal, Rajesh Bishnoi Jr, Puneet, Salman Khan, Rajat Bhatia;

Services: Soumik Chatterjee (C), Sufiyan Alam, Nakul Verma (Wk), Rajat Paliwal, Yashpal Singh, S R Swain, Mumtaz Quadri, Azharuddin Bloch, Rahul Kanojia, Suraj Yadav, Nitin Yadav, Diwesh Pathania, Shadab Nazar , Ritesh Negi, Kamal Passi.

By Subhash Chandra