• I agree with both your reasons on resting senior players but I agree more with the second reason. With a gruelling international season ahead, it is very important that our senior players rest up and reenergise so they are match ready. This is also a good opportunity for senior players to fully recover from their injury(ies).
• IPL should have helped India in their T20 WC campaign but it clearly did not and I reckon one of the reasons was due to players being worn out from a hectic IPL. And IPL is growing with more teams and matches!!
• Yes, I feel more ‘A’ games is definitely the way to go. Especially, playing in tougher conditions like Australia,England,SA and NZ which would be a huge learning experience. BCCI should wait touch longer before handing young guns their India caps! You nailed it by saying ‘
‘Every India cap must be earned and handing it out so cheaply would only devalue its importance’

I totally agree with you.I have been telling my friends this for years!!! we should hav an "A" team, comprising of players who are in a rough patch or look promising to one day earn a national team cap to do world tours. India has a deep bench strength. I wouldn't mind watching a team with players like Rohit Sharma, Uthappa, or Manish Pandey(who wasn't included in this tour either) taking on the likes of an Aussie or Kiwi team. People might say, well why would Aussies want to play our A team? well, these players have quality(how else could they beat an almost full strength Lankan team), and even though it's an "a" team, there are some big names involved. Which if you didn't get, that means there is $$$ involved. After all, isn't that all the BCCI cares about :) :) !!!

BTW Aakash,inspite of our W T20 debacles, i still feel our ODI team has transformed into the most consistent in the world over the last 2 years, and our test team is about the same too

Let me know what you think Aakash

It is not that Indian cricketers have come through the India A ranks. You had mentioned the example of Gambhir and Kohli. However, for me the prime example is MS Dhoni. He came from nowhere for the series in Kenya and made it to the headlines with his back to back hundreds against Pakistan A. Dhoni got full benefit from his exploits because the series was televised. As mentioned by you; the most important criteria to have a good bench strength is to retain the core group of stars in A team (Cricketers in the C category of BCCI contracts should walk into the A team). Only 3-4 new players should be tested for each A series. Secondly, all the A series should be televised as it gives impetus and more value to it. I am sure a cricket crazy nation like India (who watches England and Australia domestic seasons as well) will definitely lap it up.

"A" team cricket should be embraced on a global scale for the promotion and improvement of both established and emerging nations.
The ICC should expand and embrace the Intercontinental Cup for emerging nations transforming it into a competition whereby established nations "A" teams compete directly with the next tier of cricket playing countries.
This way you would create and ensure a definitive pathway to Test cricket for emeging nations while, at the same time ensure established nations continue to provide strong competition for their fringe players. Thus addressing the depth of talent required for the increasing demands of top flight international cricket.
Without going into too much detail, the basic premise would be that the top 6 established nations "A" teams would compete with the top 4 emerging nations in one division while the bottom 4 established nations "A" teams compete with the next 6 best emerging nation teams in Division 2 with promotion and relegation between the two.

Your idea of having a core team of the 'A' side same over a period of time is a positive one & thats how it should be.It should basically comprise of the next in line for the tests players.It could also involve U-19 players if they are talented enough.It is also a good opportunity to test fast bowlers.It is also important to have the same coach.The team should be made to travel at least 3 countries in a calender year and we should invite a couple of teams as well.This apart from our domestic calender.I do not quite agree with you on the U19WC players.They will take some time to mature.You now see A Mukund,M Pandey,S Goswami doing well in the domestic cricket,who were all part of the WC winning U19-2008 team.Their captain V Kohli is already making it big at the international level.That team had some very talented batters and I'm sure they all will make it big.The recent U19 team threw up some good bowling prospects along with KL Rahul in the batting.They havent yet played Ranji.

Um, you do realise that India A are touring England at the moment? I'm going to see them play Windies A at Grace Road on the 10th

current selectors are the worst in indian history .they selected Cheteshwar Pujara (c) Wriddhiman Saha
Bipul Sharma Shikhar Dhawan
Iqbal Abdulla Kedar Jadhav
Jaskaran Singh Dhawal Kulkarni
Abhimanyu Mithun Abhinav Mukund
Manish Pandey Ajinkya Rahane
Manoj Tiwary Saurabh Tiwary
Sudeep Tyagi Jaidev Unadkat
some have done nothing in domestic tornaments

I want to make two comments:
a) if you conceptualize viewers as shareholders then you can understand that they want a "win". [espec if they're the betting kind :)]
b) I'm glad you started moving towards the concept of a "core" team idea. While individual players are important. The strength is the functionality, cohesion and development of a team. As in chess, every piece has it's role.

My only saying is to include Robin Uthappa in the ODI squad.He performed well in the last IPLt20.The selectors are not looking at him.They are always taking the same players.So my only saying is to take Robin Uthappa atleast for a single series.........

I attended many games during the Emerging Players tour of Australia last year and must say its a fantastic opportunity for fringe players to get exposed to foreign conditions. Whilst the likes of M Vijay looked uninterested, Virat Kohli was a standout player, and looked a class above the pack. He since has had a reasonable time for the Indian senior team, and no doubt wouldve benefitted from the 'A' tour.

I second Aakash's views on the board promoting India A tours abroad to check our bench strength. Tours to Zimbabwe/Bangladesh (the so called minnows), the board takes active interest in checking bench strength in ODIs. The India A tours are one opportunity where we can check our bench strength in 3 day games or 4 day games which gimmick the test matches. I am really concerned about our bench strength in tests. When the likes of Sachin Tendulkar,Rahul Dravid and VVS Lakshman retire, there are not many players in India who have the same temperament or caliber as these players to play tests. The growing popularity of T20 and IPL are a threat to the test format and upbringing of young cricketers in the test mold.
Until a few years back we used to gauge a players caliber based on his test performance in the domestic Ranji trophy tournaments. Now players make it to the team based on performances in IPL which are 2 contrasting editions of cricket. Are we lacking something here?

If the tour was to australia, they would only need to play against the state sides as every state is as powerfull in cricket as some countries.

Just look at NSW Jaques,Hughes,Katich,Clarke,Haddin,Smith,Lee,Bollinger,Warner,S. Clarke and many more. And they dont win the comp a whole lot.

The problem is the attitude of our young bucks, they have a chance to impress but are losing to minnows and behaving like spoilt kids, Karthiks antics left even Tony Greig in shock - throwing your cap at the umpire and expecting him to pick it up should be a fine and ban for at least six months, lose but lose gracefully, Do not think you are the best till you achieve the rating and this preferably from outsiders and not our own biased fools................

i think money loaded ipl is the main reason. the youngsters are very overconfident and they should play ranji more seriously than ipl. also more india a tours wll also help.

T20 world cup followed by Tri Series in Zimbabwe has shown some deep concern about Indian Cricket. Indian Team's dismal performance in T20 world cup showed lack of attitude and skills to compete at the highest level of game. Some players were elected on the basis of their performance in IPL. When most of the countries were busy preparing for World Cup, our heroes were fighting hard for IPL trophy which I think is a bigger trophy for them than a world cup. Now when we look at the team playing in the Tri Series in Zimbabwe, we find that many players in this team are far below the standards of minnows like Zimbabwe. What is Kartik still doing in the team? After having been tested for a number of times at international level and failed he should be dropped from the team. Players like Irfan, R P Singh, Ishant Sharma and Robin Uthappa were not played. Are these players not better than Pankaj Singh, Umesh Yadav, Dinesh Kartik.

Again we have an excuse that we were doing experiment.Why you don't think that zimbabave and Srilanka both also send young team to participate in this tournament.but still they performed well ,is virat kholi,Ravinder jadeja, yousaf pathan and many more are un experince player,Absolutly no , But what is there performance in this series? they were not able to play a academy leveal players. Now what you can expect for the worldcup, I think on the behalf of these young guns we will not clear the first round.People feel proud that they got no.1 position in test ranking, did we play againg australia in austarlia ,againg south africa in south africa,most of the time we played in our home .if we play for the test championship in south africa i am sure that we lost there 2-0.In real manner south africa is diserve for no. 1 ranking because they beat us in india where the condition was in our favour...so dont be proud.that achived no.ranking at least on the behalf of these young guns.

Agreed. Perhaps some branding can make it useful as well - hm, can't call them Indian Lions since the English have already rebranded their A side the English Lions... Indian Tigers? Um, no, that has bad political connotations... Indian Elephants... ah yes, slow, lumbering, but above all, trainable - yep, that's perfect!

Seriously, pointing out Sri Lanka as an example is a good idea. Those islanders do pretty darn well with their limited resources.

i comletely agree with the idea of more a tours. with players like tendulkar, dravid & laxman having only a few years of international cricket left in them it is important to prepare a bunch of players who can replace them. the only answer is A team tours to different nations. more A tours will also help us know better if players like Ishant Sharma, sreesanth & irfan pathan are ready to be back in the indian team.

India have a very tough future in the coming years as after Sachin and Dravid retire, they have no player to replace them. So i guess, it is the right time to ask Laksman to retire after the India-Aus series and blend in someone like Badrinath or Pujara or Rohit in the team. Otherwise there may be serious trouble in the time following the world-cup with India having left with completely inexperienced players in the side.