CHENNAI, India CMC – Batting legend Sachin Tendulkar has opted out of India’s Test tour of the Caribbean which begins early next month.
The right-hander, considered the finest batsman of the contemporary era, has cited family commitments for his absence from the 16-man squad, while he also chose to sit out the one-day leg of the tour and will be joined on the sidelines by Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag and Yuvraj Singh who are all injured.
Gambhir was expected to lead India’s one-day side for the five-match series against the Windies but has now been replaced by Suresh Raina who will have the combative off-spinner Harbhajan Singh as his deputy, while batsmen Manoj Tiwary and Shikhar Dhawan have been added to the squad.
MS Dhoni will lead the Test squad which includes the experienced Rahul Dravid and seamer Zaheer Khan.
India open their tour with Twenty20 International in Trinidad and Tobago on June 4 before playing five one-dayers and three Tests.
SQUADS:
TEST –  MS Dhoni (captain), VVS Laxman (vice-captain), M. Vijay, Abhinav Mukund, Rahul Dravid, Virat Kohli, S. Badrinath, Harbhajan Singh, Ishant Sharma, S. Sreesanth, Amit Mishra, Pragyan Ojha, Zaheer Khan, Munaf Patel, Suresh Raina, Parthiv Patel.
ODI – Suresh Raina (captain), Ravi Ashwin, Subramaniam Badrinath, Harbhajan Singh (vice-captain), Virat Kohli, Praveen Kumar, Amit Mishra, Munaf Patel, Parthiv Patel ( wkp.), Yusuf Pathan, Wriddhiman Saha, Ishant Sharma, Rohit Sharma, Vinay Kumar, Manoj Tiwary, Shikhar Dhawan.