Cricket legends Ravi Shastri and Eoin Morgan have picked their combined ODI XI featuring stars from Indian and England cricket teams. Interestingly, neither Ravi nor Morgan picked themselves in the all-time XI despite having been ODI World Cup winners.
The side features eight Indians and only three Englishmen, with MS Dhoni being named as the captain.
Shastri had shortlisted three names for the captaincy role including Dhoni, Kapil Dev and Morgan – all World Cup winners. He went ahead with Dhoni given his wealth of experience and the fact that he’s the only man in history to have won all three major white-ball ICC tournaments as a captain.
“When it comes to captain, only three names come to my mind. One is sitting to my left (Morgan), one is Kapil
– I was part of that team in 1983 when we won the World Cup. And then of course MS Dhoni,” Shastri said.
“I would go for a modern generation player because in our time there wasn’t as much one-day cricket. That’s why the choice boils down to between Eoin and MS. I will have to give it to MS because he has won every ICC tournament, the World Cup in India. He would be my captain,” he added.
Shastri praised Morgan, who was the captain when England won their first ever ODI World Cup in 2019.
“Morgs – fantastic captain because you need to be ahead of the game and I have seen him captaining in IPL and in one-day cricket for a long period of time. He was ahead of the curve, strong, prepared to be very clear-cut in the eleven he wanted and how he would implement his strategies,” Shastri said.
The duo picked Sachin Tendulkar to open with Rohit Sharma, followed by Jos Buttler at No. 3 and Virat Kohli at No. 4.
They are then followed by the all-round trio of Yuvraj Singh, Kapil Dev and Ben Stokes, with Dhoni pencilled in at 8 as wicketkeeper-batter. Harbhajan Singh and Adil Rashid are the two spinners, with Jasprit Bumrah spearheading the pace attack.
Former India left-arm pacer Zaheer Khan has made the cut as the 12th man.
Shastri & Morgan’s Combined ODI XI: Sachin Tendulkar, Rohit Sharma, Jos Buttler, Virat Kohli, Yuvraj Singh, Kapil Dev, Ben Stokes, MS Dhoni (captain and wicketkeeper), Adil Rashid, Harbhajan Singh, Jasprit Bumrah, Zaheer Khan (12th man)
