Gilchrist queries Boucher choice ahead of Sangakkara

SYDNEY, Monday (AFP) Adam Gilchrist Monday queried the choice of South African Mark Boucher ahead of Sri Lanka's Kumar Sangakkara as the World XI's wicket-keeper for this week's Super Test here against Australia.

Sangakkara was one of the few successes for the badly-beaten World XI in their three-nil one-day series loss to the Australians in Melbourne over the last week.

Australia's gloveman felt Sangakkara's innate understanding with fellow countryman and spin wizard Muttiah Muralitharan was worth his selection alone ahead of Boucher.

Muralitharan confuses batsmen and fieldsmen alike with his bewitching turn and looms as one of the world's big attacking weapons on the spin-friendly Sydney Cricket Ground pitch this week.

Sangakkara's batting record is superior to Boucher, with the Sri Lankan left-hander scoring 3,698 runs at 48.02 in 50 Tests compared to Boucher's 3007 at 30.68 in 84 matches.

Gilchrist was surprised by the world selectors for Boucher ahead of Sangakkara, who had scores of 64, 61 and 13 in his three Super Series innings last week.

"Kumar keeping so regularly and so well to Murali is probably what jumped out at me," Gilchrist told reporters Monday.

"I thought he might have been in the Test position for that reason alone because I imagine it would be so difficult to take on in a one-off scenario.

"But their selection panel had plenty of time to ponder over it and they have come up with that one and Mark Boucher is a very well-performed cricketer for South Africa as we know."

Australian batsman Simon Katich will have treatment for a groin strain this week with Brad Hodge is likely to come into the team if Katich is unfit to play on Friday.

Gilchrist is wary of the World XI after their below-par performances in the one-day series and he expects them to be more competitive in this week's six-day Test match.

"They are probably a little bit (of) tail between their legs and they have something to prove which is a bit scary given the calibre of the players they have got on paper, they should be favourites to beat us," he said.

"And they should have been favourites on paper in that one-day series, and on paper in this Test match but as you have seen it does not always turn out that way."