Harsha Bhogle picks his Test XI of the decade

Harsha Bhogle, the enigmatic sports journalist, picked his Test XI of the decade from the year 2011 to 2020. The veteran picked a number of players, who have already announced their retirement from international cricket. To start with, he picked Alastair Cook and David Warner as his specialist openers. Cook started his Test career with a century and he bowed out with a ton as well.

His last Test was against India back in 2018 at the Kennington Oval in London. Warner is a stalwart of Australia’s Test team and he also has a triple-century against Pakistan under his belt in 2019 at the Adelaide Oval. At number three, Bhogle went for the eleven Kumar Sangakkara from Sri Lanka. The southpaw was a bedrock of the Lankan batting unit before retiring back in June 2015.

Shakib Al Hasan- the lone all-rounder in the eleven

Virat Kohli and Steve Smith, the ICC’s number-two and number-one Test batsmen respectively, feature in Bhogle’s middle-order. Even Virat was on top of the rankings when Smith was busy serving his one-year suspension period due to the ball-tampering scandal. As his wicketkeeper, Harsha zeroed in on AB de Villiers, who hung his boots from the highest level back in May 2018.

Bangladesh’s Shakib Al Hasan is Bhogle’s lone all-rounder in the eleven. Shakib last played Test cricket back in September 2019 against Afghanistan in Chattogram. Ravi Ashwin is the solitary specialist spinner Bhogle went for in his eleven. It’s also pertinent to note that Ashwin has four Test tons to show for his efforts and all of them came against the West Indies.

Pat Cummins, Dale Steyn and James Anderson are Bhogle’s fast-bowling trio. Cummins is currently ICC’s number-one ranked Test bowler and he has been going great guns, having picked over 150 wickets in the longest format.

England’s Anderson is the most successful pacer of all-time with 600 wickets to his name. Steyn, in the meantime, retired from Tests a year ago and is only focused to play in the ODI and T20I formats of the game.

Here’s Harsha Bhogle’s Test XI of the decade –

Alastair Cook, David Warner, Kumar Sangakkara, Virat Kohli, Steve Smith, AB de Villiers (wk), Shakib Al Hasan, Ravi Ashwin, Pat Cummins, Dale Steyn, James Anderson