Chennai,
India, July 7: -
Off spinner
Harbhajan Singh and fast bowler Zaheer Khan have returned
from injuries to be named in India's squad for this month's
Asia Cup one-day tournament in Sri Lanka.
The 23-year-old
Harbhajan, nicknamed 'Turbanator', has not played since
the first test in Australia in December after surgery to
repair a ligament tear on his spinning finger. Zaheer, who has
struggled with recurring hamstring problems since last year,
was also included in the 14-man squad led by captain Sourav
Ganguly.
First sidelined in Australia,
Zaheer
returned for the March-April tour of Pakistan but was sent
home midway through the series after breaking down again.
India's cricket board secretary Karunakaran Nair told
reporters on Wednesday medium-pacer
Ajit
Agarkar and left-arm spinner
Murali Kartik had been omitted from the squad after
failing to impress in the Pakistan series. Pakistan, hosts Sri
Lanka, Bangladesh, Hong Kong and the United Arab Emirates are
the other teams in the Asia Cup, to be played from July 16 to
August 1.
India also named an 'A' team, led by leg spinner Sairaj
Bahutule, to tour Zimbabwe and Kenya later this month. The
International Cricket Council has ruled that Zimbabwe will not
take part in test cricket for the remainder of 2004 following
a bitter row between the country's cricket board and 15 of
their leading white players.
India Squad:
Saurav Ganguly (captain),
Virender Sehwag,
Rahul
Dravid,
VVS
Laxman,
Sachin
Tendulkar,
Yuvraj
Singh,
Mohammad
Kaif,
Parthiv Patel,
Anil
Kumble,
Harbhajan Singh,
Zaheer
Khan,
Ashish
Nehra,
Irfan
Pathan,
Lakshmipathy Balaji.
India 'A' Squad:
Sairaj Bahutule (Capt), Hemang Badani,
Aakash
Chopra, Gautham Gambhir, Sridharan Sriram, Rohan Gavaskar,
Dinesh Karthik (wk), Amit Bhandari,
Munaf
Patel, Aavishkar Salvi, MS Dhoni, Ramesh Powar, Dheeraj
Jadhav, Shib Shankar Paul, Yogesh Golwalkar
