The Indian selectors met on Wednesday to pick the team for the Test and one-day series to be held in Bangladesh. And while the squad announced for both formats was on expected lines, there was a major surprise in the Test team, as Harbhajan Singh was handed a recall. The decision has come as a massive shock for many, and rightly so. The 'Turbanator', as he is fondly referred to, hasn't played a Test for India in the last two years. Nearing 35, he was nowhere in the scheme for things all this while as India stuck to Ravichandran Ashwin as the lead spinner in spite of him delivering mixed results. Thus, the decision to pick him out of the blue defies logic.
There are more than one reasons why Harbhajan’s inclusion does not make a lot of sense. For starters, he hasn’t done anything extraordinary to earn a recall. He has only played a handful of domestic games, and hasn’t done a lot in those matches to suggest that he is still in healthy form. Yes, he has impressed in the IPL this season, but if players are selected in the Test team based on their performances in the T20 league, it is a setting a very bad precedent, and by that criteria, a lot of mediocre players might turn up for the country in whites.
Another significant reason why Harbhajan’s recall is baffling is because India will be playing only one Test during their visit to Bangladesh. And, they already have chosen two other spinners in Ashwin, who remains India’s lead spinner, and is also an off-spinner. Karn Sharma has also been chosen as the leg-spinning option in spite of his unimpressive debut in Australia. Now, since Harbhajan has been selected, the team think-tank will have to play him since somehow, otherwise they will look like fools.
Sandeep Patil’s explanation for picking Harbhajan was that Bangladesh have many left-handers, and hence a second offie was deemed necessary. However, they did not bother to look at his form which led to him being dropped. It was a prolonged period of struggle during which Harbhajan went into complete decline. In England in 2011, he took only two wickets in 70 overs. Even worse, at home, against Australia, he managed just five wickets averaging over nearly 41. Since, India have preferred Ashwin and even Ravindra Jadeja over him.
There is a theory floating around that Harbhajan may have been recalled because Indian cricket wants to hand him a proper farewell match for his services. And, while that is not a bad move, if that is the case, the same logic should have applied in the case of Virender Sehwag, Zaheer Khan and Yuvraj Singh as well. Since they weren’t selected, the decision wasn’t probably influenced by emotion. Coincidentally, Harbhajan was constantly ignored when MS Dhoni was at the helm of things. With the change in leadership in Test matches, the ‘Turbanator’ suddenly finds himself back in the reckoning.
--By A Cricket Analyst
