Yuvraj skips Andhra game; Gurkeerat returns

Halfway through the league stage of the season and still searching for momentum, host Punjab would be hoping to overcome the absence of Yuvraj Singh when it takes on Andhra in the Ranji Trophy Group B match starting at the Dhruve Pandove Stadium here on Friday.

The team has had an eventful campaign so far. An innings victory at home was followed by an innings defeat away, and a 12-run deficit in the first innings in the last match here came close on the heels of a huge first-innings lead in a high-scoring match. That the team is still second on the table is due to the fact that the other teams, barring Mumbai, have been equally inconsistent.

Gurkeerat Singh returns to the side after his stint in the Indian dressing room for the ODIs against South Africa, but Yuvraj, attending teammate Harbhajan Singh’s wedding, has given this match a skip. “Yuvraj is the kind of player who makes a difference simply being in the team. But, we would rather play to our strengths and not think about that,” said coach Arun Sharma.

At the other end of the ground, the Andhra team was equally focused on getting its batting sorted out in its first away game of the season. With three first-innings leads under its belt but no wins, Andhra knows it has to come good soon.

Learning experience

“This is a young side and a brief bad period on the final day made all the difference. But I am confident of the boys learning from the experience and applying themselves better in this game. This is our first away game but since we have to be on the road for a while now, we are prepared for the challenge,” Parmar said.

With the pitch likely to assist turn later in the game despite the visible layer of grass, the spinners would come into play. Similarly, Sarabjeet Ladda, who took a five-wicket haul against Madhya Pradesh in the previous game, would continue to be the key for Punjab.

The teams (from):

Punjab: Gurkeerat Singh (capt.), Manan Vohra, Jiwanjot Singh, Uday Kaul, Mandeep Singh, Gitansh Khera, Himanshu Chawla, Pargat Singh, Sarbjeet Ladda, Brainder Sran, Varun Khanna, Deepak Bansal, Siddarth Kaul, Maninder Singh, and Mayank Sidhana.

Andhra: Mohammad Kaif (capt.), D.B. Prasanth Kumar, K.S. Bharat, M.U.B. Sriram, A.G. Pradeep, B. Sumanth, D. Siva Kumar, P. Vijay Kumar, Ch. Stephen, B. Aiyappa, H. Shivaraj, B. Sudhakar, K. Harish, G. Shankar Rao, G. Chiranjeevi, and K.V. Sasikanth.