October 28, 2007	Sunday	Shawwal 15, 1428

AHMEDABAD (India), Oct 27: Former India captain Rahul Dravid was on Saturday dropped from a 15-man squad to play in the first two One-day Internationals against arch-rivals Pakistan next month.

Dravid, 34, had a poor series against Australia, collecting just 51 runs from five outings and was dropped for the final game in Mumbai.

Flamboyant opener Virender Sehwag returns to the team after a gap of five months, having last played in the Afro-Asia Cup one-day series at home in June.

The selectors also included 21-year-old rookie all-rounder Praveen Kumar for the matches to be played in Guwahati (Nov 5) and Mohali (Nov 8).

Left-handed opener Gautam Gambhir, who missed the last four matches against Australia due to an injury but played a match-winning knock in a Twenty20 International at Mumbai, returns to the squad.

Chief selector Dilip Vengsarkar said Dravid was only rested and the selectors had not lost faith in him.

“Dravid has been given a break. He is a great player and I am sure he will make a comeback very soon,” Vengsarkar told reporters.

“If they need him, he’ll be there for the next few games,” he said of Dravid, dropped from the one-day team for only the second time in his career.

“Fitness and fielding are very important. We have given him a break.”

Vengsarkar also said the Test captain as well as the team for the remaining three one-dayers would be named during the second tie at Mohali. The one-dayers will be followed by a three-Test series beginning Nov 22.

Dravid stepped down as Test and one-day captain after the tour of England in July-September, saying he wanted to concentrate on his batting. But his scores against Australia read 31, 0, 13, 0 and 7.

A prolific batsman, Dravid has scored 10,585 runs in 333 one-dayers.

Squad: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (captain), Yuvraj Singh, Saurav Ganguly, Sachin Tendulkar, Rohit Sharma, Virender Sehwag, Robin Uthappa, Gautam Gambhir, Irfan Pathan, Murali Kartik, Rudra Pratap Singh, Zaheer Khan, Shanthakumaran Sreesanth, Harbhajan Singh, Praveen Kumar.—Agencies