Dream IPL team 2011

We are at the end of the group stages of the IPL 2011. Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and Bangalore has progressed to the play off. This is my dream team based on performance on the IPL.

Openers

Picks: Chris Gayle, Virender Sehwag
Gayle is an automatic selection with orange cap and 5 MOM award, His strike rate is around 200 percent and my choice for the Man of the series award.The other opener has to be one among Paul Valthaty, Sachin Tendulkar, Michael Hussey, Virendra Shewag, breadan macculam and Adam Gilchrist. Being a die hard Tendulkar fan, my heart is for Tendulkar who had Orange cap for almost half the tournament. But Shewag overshadows tendulkar by the sheer impact. Shewag's innings against DC is the innings of the tournament and is a treat to watch.

Middle Order

Picks: Shane Marsh, Virat Kohli, Mahendra Singh Dhoni
Both Marsh and Kohli has batted at 1st down. But we know Kohli can be a good second down player as well. He played second down in world cup and performed well. Dhoni is an automatic choice as keeper as none of the foreign keepers have done well to be among the 4 foreign players. Rayudu would be unlucky to miss it to Dhoni. Dhoni had a poor tournament at the beginning. Off late he had made it off. He would be the captain of the team. The unlucky batsmen who miss out are Rohit Sharma, Subramaniam Badrinath, Suresh Raina, Kumara Sangakkara, Rayudu, and Manoj Tiwary.

All-rounders

Picks: Yuvraj Singh, Yusuf Pathan
Yusuf is an easy pick as he has owned more matches and bowled tightly. Yuvraj has done fair job as batsman and did well in the bowling towards the end.Shane Watson and Albie Morkel will miss the selection as there are already 4 foreign players. Else I would have picked either of them with toss of coin for Yuvraj.

Bowlers

Picks: Lasith Malinga, Doug Bollinger, Rahul Sharma, Amit Mishra
I went with two quicks and two spinners based on performances and ensuring balance in the bowling attack. Malinga is not as effective as he was in the initial games. If Gayle is the reason why Bangalore topped the group stage. Malinga is the reason why Mumbai remained in top for more than half the time though their not-so-attractive run rate. Doug Bollinger bowls at the death and brings in variety with some left-arm pace. Rahul Sharma has been outstanding with 16 wickets at just 5.46 runs per over, by far the best economy rate of the tournament. Amit Mishra is the only person to claim at-trick and a much improved player. Shane Warne has done reasonable well as a player and Warne is my favorite captain. But he missed out as there are already 4 foreign players and other spinners have done better than him. Ishant Sharma, R P Singh, Arvind and Praveen Kumar misses the tournament as spinners has done fairly well in the tournament and we can manage with only 2 pacers. Iqbal Abdulla and Ravichandran Ashwin are unfortunate to miss the 11.


Final 11:
Chris Gayle
Virender Sehwag
Shane Marsh
Virat Kohli
Yuvraj Singh
Mahendra Singh Dhoni + (C)
Yusuf Pathan
Amit Mishra
Rahul Sharma
Doug Bollinger
Lasith Malinga