Apart from Sehwag—who has been dropped from ODIs and not included in the Test squad — Harbhajan Singh, Munaf Patel and Irfan Pathan, till recently regarded as vital cogs in the Indian cricket team’s scheme of things, have been ignored from the forthcoming tours of Ireland and England.

The decision on Sehwag came at a point when his recent performances in the Afro-Asia Cup has been encouraging with two quickfire knocks of 45 and 52 and though the committee deliberated on him for quite some time, reports suggest that Sehwag’s manner of throwing away his wicket after getting good starts despite repeated warning irked the wise men more than his current form.

Harbhajan’s form is also the reason for the off-spinner not making a comeback. “Harbhajan needs to get wickets, go back to domestic cricket and bowl well,” said Vengsarkar, while about Munaf, he added: “The committee was not completely convinced 100 per cent about his recovery from back injury and with Irfan, we want him to play a few more matches at home.”

Interestingly, there are no domestic matches scheduled till September for the quartet to showcase their improvement in form, while at the same time, there isn’t much to suggest what Robin Uthappa, who still went to Bangladesh despite a below par performance in the World Cup and didn’t play a match, or rather Ajit Agarkar have done to merit a place in the side.

VRV Singh and Rajesh Pawar—with the latter yet to make his debut —have been omitted from the Test team that featured in Bangladesh while Dinesh Mongia and injured Manoj Tiwary are the other casualties in the ODI side as the BCCI selection committee that met in the capital selected separate squads that would do national duty for the ODI series in Ireland and the Test series in England.

Sourav Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar, who were rested for the ODI series last month, make a return.

On the brighter side, Mahendra Singh Dhoni has been rewarded for his recent good form by being made the vice captain for the one-dayers. In Tests, however, it will be the veteran Sachin Tendulkar who will be the vice-captain to Rahul Dravid, who has been retained captain for both series. Though “Dhoni’s performance has been noticed”, it was said that “this selection did not mean that he was being looked at as the future skipper.”

The committee also gave rookie middle order bat Rohit Sharma his first break by naming him in the one-day team while Bengal seamer Ranadeb Bose has also been awarded for his performance with a place in the Test side. Gautam Gambhir is in the Test side too as third opener.

THE SQUADS

One-dayers: Rahul Dravid (captain), MS Dhoni (vice-captain), Sourav Ganguly, Gautam Gambhir, Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh, Dinesh Kaarthick, Zaheer Khan, S Sreesanth, RP Singh, Ajit Agarkar, Piyush Chawla, Ramesh Powar, Robin Uthappa and Rohit Sharma.

Tests: Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar (vice-captain), Wasim Jaffer, Dinesh Kaarthick (specialist opener) , Sourav Ganguly, VVS Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, MS Dhoni, Zaheer Khan, S Sreesanth, RP Singh, Anil Kumble, Ramesh Powar, Gautam Gambhir (third opener), Ishant Sharma and Ranadeb Bose.

THE ITINERARY

The BCCI working committee today finalised the itinerary for the home series against Australia and Pakistan.

Australia one-day series

Sept 29: 1st ODI (Bangalore, D/N); Oct 2: 2nd ODI (Kochi); Oct 5: 3rd ODI (Hyderabad); Oct 8: 4th ODI (Guwahati); Oct 11: 5th ODI (Baroda); Oct 14: 6th ODI (Nagpur); Oct 17: 7th ODI (Mumbai, D/N)

Pakistan one-day series

Nov 6: 1st ODI (Faridabad); Nov 9: 2nd ODI (Mohali); Nov 12: 3rd ODI (Kanpur); Nov 15: 4th ODI (Gwalior); Nov 18: 5th ODI ( Jaipur, D/N);

Pakistan Test series

Nov 22-26: 1st Test (Delhi); Nov 30-Dec 4: 2nd Test (Kolkata); Dec 8-12: 3rd Test (Bangalore)