Yuvraj Singh finds no place even in 4th-string Board President's XI squad to play Australia

PTI

New Delhi: The national selection committee, on Thursday, announced the fourth string 14-member squad said to form the Board President's XI who will face Australia in a warm-up game ahead of the five-match One-Day International series followed by a three-match Twenty20 series. Snd what seemed rather eveident is that the selectors are now looking beyond the capilibilites of Yuvraj Singh, as the veteran misses out the cut to find his name among the nation's top 7 cricketers.

The announcement for sure revealed that the 15 cricketers that had crumbled down a bealeagured Sri Lankan side in the recent ODI series would be retained for the Australia series too. And now with the Duleep Trophy coming into the scene, MSK Prasad-led selection committee chose another 45 players, the top from the domestic circuit. So that completes, 60 cricketers.

With 14 more to go, the panel went for some top performers from the 10th season of Indian Premier League like – Rising Pune Supergiant opener Rahul Tripathi, swashbuckling Mumbai Indians batsman Nistish Rana and yet another Rising Pune Supergiant players who had even proved his worth in the recent Tamil Nadul Premier League, Washington Sundar. Aprt from them, Delhi's left-arm pacer Kulwant Khejroliya also found his name on the list. Well, he was part of the MI squad this season and also has the ability to hit 140s in terms of pace. What can be worthwhile for this youngster is that the selectors have been keen on finding a left-arm pacer for the squad, ergo an opportunity to be utilised at its best, for Khejroliya.

Yuvraj failed to make the cut. The man with six sixes in an over, the cricketer who was part of India's 2011 World Cup winning squad isn't part of the top 74 cricketers of India. Suresh Raina however, found himself on the 45-players list. The two were marked unfit for the Sri Lanka tour for the ODI series, but it seems that Raina has made a return back.

"Yuvraj's fitness standards have fallen drastically and coach Ravi Shastri and skipper Virat Kohli has time and again indicated that a certain fitness standard is a must to make the cut in the national team. The selectors want to look ahead and so does the team management," a BCCI official, privy to selection matters, told PTI.

Squad:

Rahul Tripathi, Mayank Agarwal, Shivam Chaudhary, Nitish Rana, Govinda Poddar, Gurkeerat Mann, Shreevats Goswami, Akshay Karnewar, Kulwant Khejroliya, Kushang Patel, Avesh Khan, Sandeep Sharma, Washington Sundar, Rahil Shah.
Coach: Hemang Badani.