The only major decision to come out of a meeting that lasted more than an hour was that of retaining Anil Kumble as the captain for the Australia Test series beginning later this month. But then the appointment of the Bangalorean was a foregone conclusion.   

Faced with a string of injury worries to their players, especially the fast bowlers, the selectors were also forced to defer their decision to pick the team for the Australia series. Instead, the five wise men selected 24 probables from which the final 16-member squad will be selected on December 12, the last day of the third and final Test against Pakistan here at the M Chinnaswamy stadium. “Because of injuries to many fast bowlers, the selectors decided to defer the selection of the final 16 for the Australian tour to the 12th of this month. The selectors have named 24 probables and after seeing the final fitness report, the team will be chosen,” said BCCI Secretary Niranjan Shah. The selectors, however, announced a 14-member squad for the final Test here beginning from Saturday, replacing all their three pacemen — Zaheer Khan, Munaf Patel and R P Singh — who are bogged down by various injuries. Their reinforcements in the shape of Irfan Pathan, Ishant Sharma and VRV Singh are likely to join the team on Thursday. Another paceman S Sreesanth, who travelled with the team to Delhi and Kolkata, has already been ruled out of the third Test series with a shoulder injury. While there was no official word on the nature of injuries, Zaheer, it is learnt, is suffering from a groin injury. R P Singh has failed to recover from the rib injury he picked up during the one-dayers while Munaf has a back spasm.

The probables for the Australia series is peppered with openers with as many as four in the list. While Wasim Jaffer will be an automatic choice, there will be an intense battle the other spot among Gautam Gambhir, Aakash Chopra and the struggling Dinesh Kaarthick. Other Delhi opener Virender Sehwag, who had a great outing last time when India toured Australia, doesn’t find his name among probables, struggling as the right-hander is even in domestic matches. 

The committee met under the chairmanship of Dilip Vengsarkar, who made it to the venue almost two hours behind schedule. The meeting was attended by the other four selectors -- Sanjay Jagdale, Venkatapathy Raju, Bhupinder Singh (Sr) and Ranjib Biswal -- besides Shah and Kumble. Vengsarkar joined his co-selectors at around 5.30 pm.

Meanwhile former India opener Chetan Chauhan has been appointed the administrative manager for the tour Down Under while M V Sridhar, vice-president of the Hyderabad Cricket Association, has been named assistant manager who will also liaison with the media on the tour.

Team for third Test
Anil Kumble (capt),MS Dhoni (vice-captain), Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, VVS Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh, Irfan Pathan, Wasim Jaffer, Ishant Sharma, VRV Singh, Murali Kartik, Dinesh Kaarthick.

Probables for Australia series:  Kumble (capt), Dhoni (vice-capt), Dravid, Tendulkar, Ganguly, Laxman, Yuvraj, Harbhajan, Irfan Pathan, Jaffer, Ishant Sharma, VRV Singh, Murali Kartik, Dinesh Kaarthick, Gautam Gambhir, Zaheer Khan, RP Singh, Munaf Patel, Ranadeb Bose, Pankaj Singh, Piyush Chawla, Ajit Agarkar, Parthiv Patel and Aakash Chopra.