Gautam Gambhir to lead young team to West Indies

Mumbai: Gautam Gambhir has been named captain of India's limited-overs squad which will tour the West Indies to play five ODIs and one T20 beginning June 4.

Captain MS Dhoni, Sachin Tendulkar and Zaheer Khan have been rested. Sreesanth and Piyush Chawla are the two players from India's World Cup-winning squad to be axed.

Parthiv Patel, Rohit Sharma, Subramaniam Badrinath, R Vinay Kumar, Amit Mishra and Wriddhiman Saha are returning to the squad. Praveen Kumar and Ishant Sharma, who were left out of the World Cup due to injury and poor form respectively, have also returned.

Virender Sehwag has been left out of the team due to a shoulder injury, while Ashish Nehra is recovering from surgery post a finger injury.

There were other youngsters in running for an India cap. Ambati Rayudu and Paul Valthaty have matched Tendulkar run-for-run this IPL season. Left-arm spinner Iqbal Abdulla has taken 13 wickets, as has Sreesanth Aravind, Bangalore's new pace find. Pune's Rahul Sharma too has caused a stir with his quick leg-breaks.

However, the selection committee has wisely chosen those who've also performed consistently well in the traditional formats of the game.

Badrinath's fantastic show in the IPL has earned him a recall to the ODI squad after nearly three years. He has made 349 runs in nine innings at an average of 87.25 -- a phenomenal number for T20 cricket.

Pacer R Vinay Kumar, who dropped off India's radar after a fruitless tour of Zimbabwe last year, has also made a comeback after a decent show at the IPL, where he has 12 wickets in 11 games and has started bowling a Lasith Malinga-like round-arm delivery.

Leg-spinner Mishra comes in for Chawla, who had a disastrous run in the World Cup after being suddenly pushed into the ODI squad after a nearly three-year-long gap.

Chawla's form troubles have continued in the IPL where he's picked up just eight wickets in eight games, at an economy rate of 8.88. Mishra has a relatively better show of 12 wickets in 11 games at an economy of 7.37.

Praveen has been a regular fixture of the Indian ODI team but had to give up his World Cup squad to Sreesanth due to an elbow injury.

Ishant has had one great game in the IPL where he took 5-12 against Kochi Tuskers, but has done little of note in the other games.

Squad: G Gambhir (C), S Raina, P Patel (wk), V Kohli, Yuvraj Singh, S Badrinath, R Sharma, Harbhajan Singh, R Ashwin, Praveen Kumar, I Sharma, M Patel, V Kumar, Y Pathan, A Mishra, W Saha.