New Delhi, Feb 10 (IANS) A day after India suffered an innings defeat to South Africa in the Nagpur cricket test, chairman of India’s selection committee Krishnamachari Srikkanth accepted the blame for the humiliating loss.
“I don’t think the selection matter was a particular issue, but unfortunately that is the problem. When the team wins it’s fine but when the team loses, generally the selectors get bashed. So I’m willing to take the blame and own up the responsibility,” Srikkanth was quoted as saying by a television channel Wednesday.

Srikkanth added: “We have also learnt a lesson that we should not select any player who is not 100 per cent fit.”

The dropping of Dinesh Karthik from the first-Test squad came in for severe critcism as India had to play reserve wicket-keeper Wriddhiman Saha as a batsman when both V.V.S. Laxman and his last-minute back-up Rohit Sharma were ruled out with injuries on the morning of the match. Karthik responded with centuries in each innings in the Duleep Trophy final against West Zone.

The middle-order was depleted without the injured Rahul Dravid, Laxman and Yuvraj Singh, though the two Tamil Nadu batsmen Murali Vijay and Subramaniam Badrinath tried their best to fill in.

Srikkanth said that Sharma’s injury on the morning of the Test aggravated the situation which has been blown out of proportion.

“The whole thing would not have blown up if Rohit Sharma had played the game. No one would have raised any questions, irrespective of how many runs he would have scored. They all feel that Wriddhiman Saha is not a genuine batsman but a wicketkeeper who can bat. But in all fairness, Saha proved that he can bat pretty decently.”

Shell-shocked by the massive loss to South Africa in the first cricket Test, the Indian selectors dropped two young seamers and brought in Karthik and Suresh Raina to bolster batting for the second cricket Test, starting at the Eden Gardens, Kolkata, Sunday.

Also back is fast bowler Shantakumaran Sreesanth, who was injured during the Bangladesh series, after seeing lack of support for strike bowler Zaheer Khan as Ishant Sharma was totally ineffective on a pitch on which South African pacers Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel rattled the Indian batsmen.