Special: Cricket board caught in a cleft stick

Hardik Pandya (Image - Google Search)

Jan.14 (CRICKETNMORE) - The euphoria of winning a Test series in Australia for the first time is over and the India teams focus is now on the World Cup in England this summer.

Before the first of the three-match One-Day series against Australia, the selectors and the team management seem to have finalised the World Cup squad. The loss in Sydney has triggered a debate over everything with the team.

The middle-order is seen wobbly, the so-called finisher is not to be found and there are the perennial questions about Mahendra Singh Dhoni's batting, his scoring rate and whether he should bat at No 4, 5 or 6. One defeat, and there is a talk of more changes than one for Tuesday's second match at Adelaide. 

As luck would have it, the two certainties for the World Cup, Hardik Pandya and Lokesh Rahul, went on a bitchy television chat show and made themselves look like oafs. They lost their marbles and made some asinine remarks, trying to ape the stars from the tinsel world.

As if to match with the two morons, the Indian Cricket Board and its supervising body, the Committee of Administrators (CoA), complicated matters by not deciding quickly on the process of disciplinary action. The two players, who looked certainties for the World Cup till that fateful night with Koffee with Karan, have been suspended and asked to return home pending an inquiry.

They have been replaced by Tamil Nadu all-rounder Vijay Shekhar and exciting Punjab batsman Shubman Gill, 19, both coming through the rungs of domestic cricket and performing for India A and with Rahul Dravid's strong recommendation.

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