Your selection might have been the same but how many of the fringe players have you actually seen? Anyone can look up stats and watch a few games on TV and come up with opinions. The selectors are the ones who watch the boring Ranji and Duleep trophy matches to see first hand how good the players are. If you've ever been watched cricket regularly at a stadium, you'll notice things which you don't see on TV - body language, athleticism, involvement and instincts. The captain and most senior players barely have time to play domestic cricket, forget watching it in different venues in such a big country. I can bet that none of us heard of a certain Dhoni from Jharkhand or Sreesanth from Kerala, till they were selected. Nor were their performances in domestic cricket outstanding as they played for losing teams.

Hi there : Good article & u r right. IMO - Selectors should be NEUTRAL. All this regional feelings, prefernces which has KILLED so many careers in Indian cricket will be gone for sure. Lets see --- Based on performance players will be selcted right..then why do we need Indian Selector??? I would prefer a group of selectors from different countries. I'm a PROUD fan of VVS laxman & its a BIG SHAME to INDIAN Selectors for giving the treatment to a CLASS player like VVS. If I was VVS I would have seriously considered retirement for the insult given. After all --- SELECTORS are bunch of Jokers.. as per the great Mohinder Amarnath & that is true till today. THANKS, Kumar

Fair points that you have raised & that work can be done by other small officials who have good CRICKET knowledge OR even that work can be given to Neutral people. Also --- if you have observed only after GREG CHAPPELL (Neutral) came as COACH you are seeing the new talent -- being given fair chances & hope. Never happend like this in Indian cricket history. Which proves my point -- with NEUTRAL Coach & selectors & officials --- things will IMPROVE for Indian cricket

who said you are 1005 right .....according to me Mohammad kaif deserved the world cup ........he could have come in place of dinesh kartik......as he was a very exceptional fielder and a good experience batsman too.....and also we dont need 3 wicket keepers and newayz at this moment india is weak at fielding only.

My friend, the question is not about being 100% correct or incorrect (in your case 1005). The question in debate is about being to predict a similar teams as the selectors did. The point of the article is not being right or wrong but just being accurate in predicting. A simple point which you might have missed is the fact that I am trying to point out that a common man like me can come up with the same team as the selectors did which means that their role is redundant. Thanks for your comment. Appreciate.

Kumar, Your comments as opposed to others are very thoughtful. Thanks. Appreciate.

My friend, if the selectors are looking into so many domestic matches, please make me understand the need to go back to a Sehwag or Ganguly. Ganguly is a great player and should not have been sacked in the first place, but due to lack of any bench strength, he is back and I am happy for him. Sehwag, on the other hand, needs a replacement which your favorite selectors could not find. If they are watching so many domestic games, why was even one talent given a chance rather than putting faith in a failed batsmen. Thanks for your interesting comment though.

The selectors aren't responsible for the lack of talent. Also, with the world cup it's unlikely they would experiment with fresh faces. They did that for the last year and tried out a lot of players, who most people weren't aware of. I'm not a big of the zonal system, and the selectors should be held more accountable, but I also don't think that past record makes much of a difference. Australia has routinely had selectors (and their current and next coach) have almost no test experience. I agree Sehwag doesn't deserve to be in the team on form, but from what I can read Dravid has pressed for his selection. I also think the team was right in dropping Ganguly. He wasn't playing well and his record against good opposition was very bad at that point.

Let me be first to thank you for your logicla analysis. However, I think, there would be some problems if the job of the team selection is given to the captain and the core players. How can you be so sure that the captain and other players would be fair while making the team. You can take the clash of two legendary bowlers of Pakistan- Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis as an example. After Imran Khan, Pakistan got these two bowlers but cuold not get any big success in the cricket world and I will request you to check how many matches these two W played together. My second question to you is that how do you define the term 'Core Player'. If you mean that core player means the senior members of the team then there will also have dispute to decide who are the senior members to take part in the team selection. At the end, I agree with you that VVS Lazman should have been included in the squad or at lesat he should have given a chance to prove his form in the series against Sri Lanka.

No for what reason we need a selection panel because now all selection happening only accordance with some strong influence and money.It is actually showing in the performance of team India really these peoples are cheating our own country.They are playing with public treasure then why they want to worry.it is very very pathetic situation of our great India.