Virender Sehwag to lead India in next match against Sri Lanka- Cricket News Update
The 33-year old opening batsman, Virender Sehwag, is expected to be named as the stand-in-captain in the absence of regular skipper, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, for the next match of the Commonwealth Bank series against Sri Lanka, on Tuesday Feb 21, 2012.
The right-hander is likely to lead his team for the 12th time in an ODI, as Dhoni has been suspended for one game, due to a second slow over-rate offense, committed by his team, in less than a year.
Sehwag, who started his ODI career in 1999 against Pakistan, has scored 8055 runs in 242 ODIs, with a highest ODI individual score of 219 in Dec, 2011 against the West Indies.
The top-order batsman has previously captained the side in 11 ODIs in his career so far, where he has won 7 matches and lost 4, while in the longer-version of the game, he has lead the team 4 times, with 2 wins, a loss and a draw.
The veteran skipper, Dhoni, is suspended for the second time in the on-going tour, as he was also banned for the third Test match against Australia, breaching a similar offense.
The International Cricket Council read out a statement which said, "At its meeting in June 2011 in Hong Kong, the ICC Executive Board had discussed the issue of slow over-rates and accepted the recommendation of the ICC Cricket Committee that a captain of
an international side should be suspended for one match if his side is guilty of two minor over-rate offences in the same format over a 12-month period."
The Men in Blue were found two overs short in their last match against Australia in Brisbane, where match referee, Andy Pycroft, fined Dhoni 40% and the rest of the players 20% of the their match fee. The Indians were also found guilty of the same offence
last year in the World Cup Final against Sri Lanka
The left-handed wicket-keeper batsman, Parthiv Patel is expected to be included in the team. Parthiv has not featured in the on-going series so far, however; he has represented the national team in 37 ODIs and 20 Test matches, averaging 24.40 and 29.69 respectively.