Rotation policy: Will Mahendra Sigh Dhoni ask Sachin Tendulakar to ‘rest’ at Adelaide?

If Mahendra Singh Dhoni carries on with Team India’s rotation policy of resting the top three batsmen, then Sachin Tendulkar might be resting his heels in the dressing room at Adelaide Oval. Will the team management have the guts to ask the Master to sit out of the clash against Australia at the Adelaide Oval to accommodate Rohit Sharma and thereby delay the legend's quest for the elusive 100th hundred?, asks The Times Of India.

Dhoni had insisted India would continue to drop one of their top three to make space for Sharma in the middle-order, which has come in for a lot of criticism from the formers players. And if India ignore calls from former cricketers like Sunil Gavaskar and Wasim Akram to do away their rotation policy, the wait the Master Blaster’s hundredth hundred will continue.

The newspapers back home have also questioned if Rohit Sharma has been made the fall guy on pretext of rotation policy. “It's his own batting colleagues who could be sending him the distressing signals.  After spending the entire Test series on the sidelines, Rohit failed to deliver with the bat in the first two matches of the tri-series and to make matters worse for the right-hander, he is now made to understand that his place in the playing eleven is at the expense of one of three senior openers - Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir. To add to it, the fact that Rohit is India's best limited overs batsman since the last World Cup is not enough to guarantee him a place in the playing eleven,” say the newspapers report.

Coming to Sri Lanka, their top order batsmen will have to deliver when they go into their second tri-series match against in-form Australia, hoping to revive their fortunes after a series of indifferent shows of late, says a report in Hindustan Times.

Except for young Dinesh Chandimal, no other Sri Lankan batsman made any substantial contribution against India on Wednesday and the visitors will be determined to put up a better show. Sri Lanka will need Tillakaratne Dilshan to fire at the top while Kumar Sangakkara and skipper Mahela Jayawardene would be key in the middle-order and the duo will have to make its experience and class count.

Meanwhile, former Pakistan all-rounder in his column in TOI writes that according to him Australia are the favourites at the moment to win the title. “They are the home team and know the conditions well. But if I were the Australian think-tank, I would be worried about the inexperience in their bowling department.  I believe that’s where India score over the hosts. They have experience in their bowling thanks to the presence of Zaheer Khan. India have enough experience in their batting department as well. They must have got charged up after winning the last game,” he says.