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captain made his intensions
loud and clear at the end of the first test;
with this tour certainly the last for senior
pro Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid, India’s
GenNext are willing to gift them a historic
series victory.
At the same time, India will also be wary
of their record of losing the series after
leading 1-0 as it happened in South Africa
in 2006 and West Indies in 2002. The McLean
Park pitch at Napier has drawn a lot of
attention for fungus infection on it; however
the curator Phil Stoyanoff has denied it
saying it is a typical Napier pitch where
lots of runs are scored. This may not be
a good news for the home team but a well
spread grass on it may give them some hope.
Team News:
New Zealand is hit hard by injury problems
to Daniel Flynn and Ian O’Brien; however
the later is expected to take the field
on Thursday. Jamie How who has been called
in as a cover for Flynn is likely to open
the batting for New Zealand. Their coach
Andy Moles had indicated that Jeetan Patel
would play, so he might replace Chris Martin.
Captain Daniel Vettori expressed his interest
in having Jacob Oram in his line up but
the selectors decided otherwise as the veteran
all-rounder is yet to recover fully from
an injury.
On the other hand, India has no such troubles
and they are likely to go into the match
unchanged. This means that Balaji and Co.
will have to wait their turn until Wellington.
India XI: Gautam Gambhir,
Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar,
VVS Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, Mahendra Singh
Dhoni (Capt & Wk), Harbhajan Singh,
Zaheer Khan, Ishant Sharma and Munaf Patel.
New Zealand XI (likely):
Tim McIntosh, Jamie How/ Daniel Flynn, Ross
Taylor, Jesse Ryder, Martin Guptill, James
Franklin, Brendon McCullum (Wk), Daniel
Vettori (Capt), Kyle Mills, Iain O'Brien
and Chris Martin/ Jeetan Patel.
Match Starts: March 26,
2009 Thursday, 10.30 AM local time
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