Axed Dravid's one-day future in doubt

Veteran Indian batsman Rahul Dravid's one-day future looked in doubt Thursday after he was dropped for the first two home matches against world champions Australia starting later this month.

The 36-year-old had returned to the team for a tri-series in Sri Lanka last month after spending nearly two years in the wilderness. He figured in three more matches in the recent Champions Trophy in South Africa before being axed again.

Dravid, only the third Indian after Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly to have completed 10,000 one-day runs, fared reasonably well on his return as he scored 180 in the last five matches.

Hard-hitting opener Virender Sehwag and all-rounder Yuvraj Singh returned to the squad after recovering from injuries.

Sehwag, who missed the World Twenty20 in England in June and the Champions Trophy due to a shoulder injury, has scored 6,592 runs in 205 one-dayers with 11 centuries.

India's squad for first two one-dayers:

Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt), Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina, Virat Kohli, Ravindra Jadeja, Harbhajan Singh, Ashish Nehra, Munaf Patel, Sudeep Tyagi, Praveen Kumar, Ishant Sharma, Amit Mishra.

Schedule:

Oct 25: First one-dayer at Vadodara

Oct 28: Second one-dayer at Nagpur

Oct 31: Third one-dayer at Delhi

Nov 2: Fourth one-dayer at Mohali

Nov 5: Fifth one-dayer at Hyderabad

Nov 8: Sixth one-dayer at Guwahati

Nov 11: Seventh one-dayer at Mumbai

CHENNAI, India, Thursday (AFP)