NEW DELHI, Dec 28: Mumbai batsman Amit Pagnis will lead a 14-member India (under-19) team in the Junior World Cup to be played in South Africa between January 11 and February 1, 1998. Punjab batsman Riteender Sodhi, who led India to the under-15 World Cup title last year, will be his deputy.Former India captain Krishnamachari Srikkanth will be the coach and Gautam Dasgupta of Bengal the manager.
Announcing the squad at the Kotla here today, BCCI joint secretary, Jyoti Bajpai, and junior selection committee chairman Hemant Kanitkar said Sriram Kannan, who was a certainty had to be dropped because the Mumbai medium-pacer pulled a muscle and was out of action in the on-going CK Nayudu Trophy tournament. The team leaves for Johannesburg from on January 6.
India, who take on hosts South Africa in the inaugural match on January 11, form part of the Gavaskar pool. The other two teams in the pool are Kenya and Scotland.
Three other pools, namely Sobers, Bradman and Cowdrey, have 12 teams from the seven other
Test-playing countries, winners and runners-up from the Bermuda Youth Cup (Ireland, Scotland), ICC winners and runners-up (Kenya and Namibia) and two Asian teams from Bangladesh and Singapore. Apart from this, the ICC will also name a wildcard entrant.
The Indian squad, which underwent a 10-day camp and played a series of trial matches, will disperse and assemble once again here before its departure for Johannesburg on January 6.
Kanitkar said that the committee has picked the best talent available in the country and all the members have performed reasonably well to be included.Coach Srikkanth was confident of the boys performance and said it was the best talent available. ``The boys are very enthusiastic and disciplined. Maybe, we may have left out two-three good boys but the selected ones are better.''
He also said that the World Cup will help a lot of youngsters to stake their claims for the higher level. ``I remember my days. I started as an under-19 player and it is a good build-up for the
future,'' he said.
The team: Amit Pagnis (c, Mumbai), Riteender Sodhi (vice-captain, Punjab), Mohammad Kher (UP), Vasant Saravanan (TN), Virender Shewag (Del), Laxmi Ranjan Shukla (WB), Arvind Solanki (UP), Javed Anwar (wicket-keeper, UP), Shiv Sagar Singh (WB), Harbhajan Singh (Pnb), Amit Bhandari (Del), Sreekumar Nair (Ker), Sumit Panda (Bih) and Rajesh Pawar (Mum). Coach: Krishnamachari Srikkanth (TN). Manager: Gautam Dasgupta (WB).
Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
