Under Sourav Ganguly's firm leadership, Indian cricket reached new heights over a period of five years (2000-2005).
From qualifying to the finals of 2003 World Cup, sharing the 2002 Champions Trophy with Sri Lanka, winning the 2004 Test series in Pakistan and drawing Test series in England and Australia – Team India achieved it all and a lot more with Ganguly at the helm of affairs.
Moreover, a number of big names such as Virender Sehwag, Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh, Zaheer Khan among others flourished under his captaincy.
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Nowadays, the current India team led by Virat Kohli often gets compared with Ganguly’s side, especially for performing well in Test cricket away from home.
The Kohli-led team has won Test series in Australia, West Indies (twice), Sri Lanka (twice) and was extremely competitive despite suffering defeats in England and South Africa. In fact, the current side was dethroned from the top spot in Test rankings for the first time in close to four years after ICC announced the latest rankings in April this year.
Therefore, Ganguly was recently asked to pick five cricketers from the current Test side to his team. In reply, the former India skipper decided to go with Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Shami, Ravindra Jadeja and justified his choices as well.
“It is a tough question as every generation the players are different. In your current team, I would have loved to had Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma in the side. I would not pick you (Mayank) as I had Virender Sehwag. I’ll go for Bumrah as I had Zaheer at the other end. I would also go for Mohammad Shami after Javagal Srinath retired. I had Harbhajan and Anil Kumble in my side, so Ashwin would be my third spinner. I would be tempted to have Ravindra Jadeja also,” he told Mayank Agarwal in the latest episode of ‘Open Nets with Mayank’, uploaded on BCCI website.
Under Kohli, India qualified to the semi-final of 2019 World Cup, having topped the group stage with seven wins from eight completed games. However, the Men in Blue succumbed under pressure in the last-four clash against New Zealand at Old Trafford.
Mayank also asked Ganguly to “pick three cricketers from India’s World Cup 2019 squad you would have loved to have in your World Cup 2003 squad”.
To which, Ganguly replied: “(Virat) Kohli, Rohit Sharma and (Jasprit) Bumrah.”
Explaining the reasons, he said: “The quality of fast bowler (Bumrah). We played in South Africa, although we bowled exceptionally well in that series. Bumrah, Rohit, and Virat would be in the middle. Rohit at the top, and I at no. 3. I don’t know maybe Sehwag might be listening to this and I would get a phone call tomorrow, ‘what the hell do you think’. But I would have these three in the squad.”
