THE BIG THREE OUT OF CHALLENGER'S TROPHY

India’s top three cricketers - Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid - will not take part in the upcoming NKP Salve Challenger Trophy with the selectors deciding to rest them in view of the busy schedule ahead. Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh and Irfan Pathan have also been rested from the tournament to be held in Ahmedabad from October 25 to 28.

Virender Sehwag, who was not part of India’s one-day team, will lead the India Blue team while Mohammad Kaif was named captain of India Red. Wicketkeeper-batsman Parthiv Patel will captain India Green.

All the players who have joined the Indian Cricket League were not named in any of the three teams announced by BCCI Secretary Niranjan Shah through a press release. Although the release did not specify why senior players were left out, a BCCI source said it was done only to give them rest ahead of the series against Pakistan and Australia.

Pakistan were scheduled to visit India in November and December for three Tests and five one-dayers which would be followed by India’s tour of Australia.

The tournament will provide a chance for Munaf Patel, Suresh Raina and others looking to cement their place in the Indian team. Murali Kartik, who got a surprise recall to the senior side after a long gap midway through the ongoing series against Australia, has found a place in the India Green team.

Each team will play once against each other to decide the finalists.

Teams:

India Red : Mohammad Kaif (capt), Karan Goel, Gautam Gambhir, Subramaniam Badrinath, Virat Kohli, Ravneet Ricky, Praveen Kumar, Mahesh Rawat (wk), Pragyan Ojha, Sidharth Trivedi, Ishant Sharma, Pinal Shah, Srikant Munde, Paresh Patel.

India Blue : Virender Sehwag (capt), Ajinkyaa Rahane, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Suresh Raina, Neeraj Patel, Arjun Yadav, Joginder Sharma, Ramesh Powar, Amit Mishra, Yo Mahesh, Randeb Bose, Swapnil Asnodkar, Rakesh V Dhruv, Saurav Bandekar

India Green : Parthiv Patel (capt/wk), Cheteswar Pujara, Rohit Sharma, Murali Kartik, Manoj Tiwary, Yusuf Pathan, Abhishek Nayar, Niranjan Behra, Iqbal Abdullah, Pankaj Singh, Munaf Patel, Gagandeep Singh, Anirudh Srikant, Satyajeet Parab.