Former South African skipper Graeme Smith and ex-Indian cricketer VVS Laxman on Sunday combined to pick a dream team of 11 players who could challenge Virat Kohli-led India at home in Tests.
Since February 2013, India have won 11 straight Test series in their den, breaking a world record set by the famed Australian teams led by Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting. It has led to many cricket experts thinking which team can give India a run for their money at home.
India is thumping South Africa at the moment in the ongoing three-match series. After winning the first two games, the home side once again posted a mammoth total on the board in their first innings at Ranchi. The utter dominance has led to the cricket pundits Smith and Laxman picking the Dream11 team, which can at least challenge India at home.
The two cricketing stalwarts have picked three Australians, two each from South Africa, England and Bangladesh, and one apiece from New Zealand and England in their combined team.
Kane Williamson and Steve Smith are the unanimous choices in batsmen, given their success on the pitches in Asia, especially Smith, who smashed three centuries in four Tests during the 2017 Australia tour of India.
Apart from them, Pakistan’s Babar Azam has been picked with Dean Elgar and Tamim Iqbal, who will open the innings.
Ben Stokes and Shakib Al Hasan are the two all-rounders, given their success across the globe. Quinton de Kock will the wicket-batsman in the dream XI and rightly so. The Proteas southpaw slammed an authoritative ton in the first of the ongoing Test series.
The bowling attack sees Pat Cummins and Jofra Archer as the fast bowlers, with the former making his Test return in 2017 and being successful, while the latter has done exceedingly well in the IPL and his first Test series against Australia, troubled the best of the best.
Nathan Lyon, who had a brilliant series against India in 2017, is the premier spinner in the Dream11 team.
Here’s the Dream11 team to challenge India at home:
Dean Elgar, Tamim Iqbal, Kane Williamson, Steve Smith, Babar Azam, Shakib Al Hasan, Ben Stokes, Quinton de Kock (wk), Pat Cummins, Jofra Archer, Nathan Lyon.
