Tour of South Africa 2010-11                       Captain: M S Dhoni

India's 64th Test tour

(December 2010  -

           January 2011)

Fifth Test-playing tour of South Africa by India

    (previous tour 2006-07)

India coach Gary Kirsten asked that players should go to South Africa at least a week ahead of the Test series to acclimatise in the absence of any practice games. Dhoni felt that experience  in the IPL and Champions League in South Africa and the advice of their coach would familiarise the team with the conditions by using net practice sessions

Defeated in the first Test at Centurion, the Indians bounced back to square the series at Durban. Both sides had good moments in the Cape Town decider before the match there was eventually drawn

Other Indian tours

Previous tour

Sri Lanka 2010

Next tour

West Indies 2010-11

Next South African tour

2013-14

Members of the Test tour party  (17)

Opening batsmen:  Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag, Murali Vijay.

Middle-order batsmen:Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman, Suresh Raina, Cheteshwar Pujara

Wicket-keepers:Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Wriddhiman Saha

Spinners: Harbhajan Singh, Pragyan Ojha.

Fast bowlers:Sreesanth, Ishant Sharma, Zaheer Khan, Umesh Yadav, Jaidev Unadkat

Zonal representation

 Duleep Trophy teams

C: Central (2), E: East (2), N: North (4), S: South (5), W: West (4)

 Ranji Trophy teams

Ba - Baroda (1)

Bn - Bengal (1)

D - Delhi (3)

H - Hyderabad (2)

Jk  - Jharkhand (1)

K - Karnataka (1)

Ke - Kerala ( 1)

Mb - Mumbai (1)

Pj - Punjab (1)

Sa -  Saurashtra (2)

TN -  Tamil Nadu (1)

UP  - Uttar Pradesh (1)

Vb - Vidarbha (1)

Average age of  team at time of first Test match

  (16 December 2010) :

      28 yrs  5 months

Test Appearances made before the tour

Tendulkar 174,  Dravid 147,  Laxman 117,  Harbhajan Singh 90,  Sehwag 84,  Zaheer Khan 76,  Dhoni 51,  Gambhir 36,  Sharma 28,  Sreesanth 21,  Ohja 11,  Vijay 8,  Raina 7, Pujara 1,  Saha 1,  Unadkat 0,  U Yadav 0. 

Tour Officials

Ranjib Biswal was president of Orissa Cricket Association and managed the team into the 2011 World Cup.

Selectors

Kris Srikkanth (chairman),  Yashpal Sharma,  Narendra Hirwani,  Surendra Bhave and  Raja Venkat.

The National Selection Panel met in Nagpur on Saturday night 20 November.

Selection

Tour Party Announced: The team was chosen on 20 November 2010 and announced the next day.

Not selected :  Amit Mishra,  Yuvraj Singh.

Time between selection and departure from India

  x days

 (21 November - 6 December)

Travel

Mumbai  Q   London

Coach Gary Kirsten and the Test specialists left early for the tour of South Africa, while the ODI side were still playing against New Zealand at home, arriving eight days before the first Test to prepare because there was no warm-up fixture arranged.

The first batch (Dravid, Sehwag, Pujara, Unadkat, Umesh Yadav and Kirsten) left on 6 December; the next group (Tendulkar, Laxman, Harbhajan, Dhoni, Sreesanth, Ishant Sharma, Ojha, Saha, Raina and manager Ranjib Biswal) left on 8 December. They acclimatised at Kirsten’s academy in Claremont, Cape Town.

The last three players (Zaheer Khan, Gautam Gambhir and Murali Vijay) were involved in the the ODI series against New Zealand, which ended on 10 December. They flew to Johannesburg on 12 December with remaining members of the support staff. The team stayed in Johannesburg, an hour’s drive from Centurion, the venue for the first Test.

For the limited overs matches after the Test series, R Ashwin, P P Chawla, V Kohli, P Kumar, A Nehra, M M Patel, Y K Pathan, R G Sharma and Yuvraj Singh flew in.

Time spent in South Africa          

     x days

(8 December - depart Host)

On-tour selection committee

-

Reinforcements

Openers Virender Sehwag (arm injury) and Gautam Gambhir (shoulder injury) withdrew from the one-day squad and were replaced by Murali Vijay, who remained with the team after the Test series, and Rohit Sharma.

Fast bowler Praveen Kumar aggravated an elbow injury in the T20 match and returned home, being replaced by Ishant Sharma..

Sachin Tendulkar tweaked his right hamstring while batting in the 2nd ODI and returned home. Parthiv Patel replaced him

Fixtures/Results

† not first-class

⊕  20/20 international

§  Tournament ODI

Time spent in South Africa before First Test:

 8 days

(8 - 16 December)

Test appearances on tour

3 -   Dhoni,  Dravid,  Harbhajan,  Laxman,  Sehwag,  Sharma,  Sreesanth,  Tendulkar.

2  -  Gambhir,  Pujara,  Zaheer Khan

1 -   Raina,   Unadkat,  Vijay

0 -   Ohja,   Saha,  Umesh Yadav.

Match appearances

T  Test match

o  one-day international 

x other match 

⊕ T/20 international

∙  played for opposition

W won  L lost  D drawn  

N no result   A abandoned  

u unknown result

Highlights

•    Sachin Tendulkar’s 111* at Centurion was his fiftieth century in Tests.

•    Dhoni (90) added 172 in a partnership with Tendulkar at Centurion.

•    Harbhajan Singh took 4-10 to give India an unexpected lead at Durban, and Sreesanth captured 3-45 to take the vital wickets which won the match.

•    Sreesnath also took 5-114 at Cape Town and Tendulkar scored a second century (146) in the series.

•    Harbhajan Singh had figures of 7 for 120 at Cape Town.

Tour Summary

Return to India

Mumbai  Q  London

Dravid, Laxman, Ohja, Pujara, Saha, Unadkat, and Yadav were not in the one-day squad and went home at the conclusion of the Test matches.

Gambhir, Sehwag, Praveen Kumar and Tendulkar also returned home early because of injury.

Last match ends 23 Jan

Time away from India

  approx 49  days  

(6 December  to January)

Finances

Published accounts of the tour

Postscript