Port Elizabeth ODI: Pre and post match discussion

[Ram]

sorry srirarm, fineleg is on the money with this one. In a squad of 15, you definitely need a reserve keeper. There's been plenty of freak accidents over the years that's resulted in plenty of people missing matches. In fact I think the Windies keeper was hit in the mouth in the nets when India toured in 97. Imagine if that happened to Dhoni, god forbid he gets hit in the eye. Don't think he'll play through it, and even if he wants too, I'm pretty sure a two eyed parthiv is better then a one eyed dhoni. My world cup squad of 15 would ideally include 7 batsmen, 6 bowlers, and two keepers. We don't have ANYONE that even keeps part time. Losing Dhoni is too much of a risk. Your statement of "don't pick squads for freak accidents", well that's why we have reserves. For situations like these...otherwise what's the point of them ? My squad: Sachin Tendulkar Virender Sehwag Gautam Gambhir Yuvraj Singh Suresh Raina Yusuf Pathan Mahendra Singh Dhoni Harbhajan Singh Zaheer Khan Praveen Kumar Piyush Chawla Reserves: Virat Kohli Ravichandra Ashwin Parthiv Chawla Munaf Patel

No dude, we have reserves to cover for things like different playing conditions (i.e, if the track is spin friendly, you play an extra spinner, if it has bounce and movement, you play an extra seamer etc..), You also have reserves in case one of your first choice players is out of form or yes, injured as well. Many teams play horses for courses as well. For example, if the opposition team has a document weakness against wrist-spin, you can play the wrist-spinner in the place of a finger spinner. You cannot pick a player just to cover for a specific contingency situation. That doesn’t make sense at all. Sure, keepers have been injured before match-days, but that doesn’t mean include a keeper JUST to cover for that. That’s an absolute waste of a squad spot. Plus, if you’re going to go down the route of picking players for contingency situations, where will it end?