Sreesanth misses ticket to South Africa with life ban

Zee Media Bureau/Suyash Srivastava

New Delhi: He might be controversial, he might be aggressive. But When Sreesanth bowls, you can see the effort he puts into every delivery. When India last toured South Africa in 2010, Sreesanth displayed one of the finest spells of pace bowling from an Indian bowler at Durban Test which India won by 87 runs. Though he picked one wicket in the first innings of AB de Villiers (0), but as South Africa needed just over 300 runs to win the match, Sreesanth once again bowled his heart out in the second innings and picked pivotal wickets of skipper Graeme Smith (37), Hashim Amla (16) and Jacques Kallis (17). Kallis in particular was dismissed off a snorter, an unplayable delivery that bounced as the all-rounder was taken aback and he fended at it edging it straight to gully which also ended the 41-run partnership between him and De Villiers. But now as Team India will once again tour South Africa later this year, they will do so without Sreesanth who missed his ticket this time, after he was imposed with a life ban by the BCCI for his alleged role in the IPL spot-fixing scandal. Under seaming conditions, while Bhuvneshwar Kumar would be an obvious choice for the overseas tour, had Sreesanth been playing clean cricket, Dhoni would probably have also taken Sreesanth along, ignoring his controversial attitude.