Harbhajan Singh questions Wasim Jaffer's all-time India ODI XI for excluding Virender Sehwag

During this lockdown period, many cricket experts have come out and made their all-time XIs. Former Indian batsman Wasim Jaffer also joined the bandwagon. He made an all-time XI of the best ODI players for India. In his list, he included all the players who have played exceeding well for India in ODIs.

In his list, he had Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly. There is no doubt that these two were the best ODI players to have played for India. This XI then included Rohit Sharma at no. 3 and Virat Kohli at no. 4. While making the XI, Jaffer missed out on a wonderful ODI batsman and Harbhajan Singh pointed that to him.

Harbhajan Singh surprised by Sehwag’s exclusion from Wasim Jaffer’s all-time India ODI XI

Jaffer then included Yuvraj Singh and MS Dhoni as his no. 5 and no.6. Dhoni, who led India in 200 ODIs, was handed over the captaincy of this all-time team. But, the person whom Jaffer missed out was his former opening partner Virender Sehwag. Harbhajan quoted the former Mumbai batsman’s tweet saying, “No Sehwag???”

Sehwag had a tremendous record in ODIs. In 251 ODIs, he scored 8273 runs at an average of 35.05. His strike rate was quite magnificent at 104.33. He scored 15 centuries and 38 half-centuries. Sehwag was also the second batsman to score a double century in ODIs. At one time, his knock of 219 was the highest individual score in ODI history.

It was surprising how Jaffer missed out on picking the Delhi player who has so many records in the ODI format. Though, some might say that his Test record, where his average close to 50 with more than 8,000 runs, is much better than ODIs.

Coming back for his all-time side, Jaffer then included Kapil Dev as his all-rounder. He also decided to keep a toss-up between Ravindra Jadeja and Harbhajan Singh for one spot of the spinner. Anil Kumble, who has the most number of wickets in the format for any Indian, was also included in the side. The two fast bowlers were Zaheer Khan and Jasprit Bumrah.

Wasim Jaffer’s all-time India ODI XI: Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Yuvraj Singh, MS Dhoni (C/WK), Kapil Dev, Ravindra Jadeja/Harbhajan Singh, Anil Kumble, Zaheer Khan, Jasprit Bumrah