Gambhir will, however, lead India A in a practice match

against Australia from February 16 to 18 in place of Dhawan. The four-match Test series will start in Chennai on February 22. The fact that Dhawan is a left-hander could have tilted the scales in his favour as Gambhir is a southpaw. The 27-year-old's most recent noteworthy batting effort was a hundred for Delhi in a warm-up match against England in November. Dhawan, who has scored 833 runs in the current first-class season with four hundreds, has played five ODIs and a Twenty20 International for India. Although retained, Sehwag has also not been in the best of form and missed a chance to get some runs under his belt by skipping the Irani Cup tie here due to a stomach bug. Murali Vijay and Ajinkya Rahane are the other two openers in the squad. The 28-year-old Vijay had cracked a century in the ongoing Irani Cup match against Mumbai. In absence of Irfan Pathan, the all-rounder's slot has once again gone to Ravindra Jadeja with the selectors deciding against picking Suresh Raina, who had made his case with a hundred and 70 plus in the Irani Cup. Speculation was rife about S Sreesanth making a comeback to the team having recovered from career-threatening toe injury but the maverick pacer was ignored despite an earnest effort in the Irani Cup. Similar was case of Wasim Jaffer, who was in contention for a call-up after more than four years, but failed to get the nod despite scores of 80 and 100 in the match. Jaffer has plundered more than 900 runs at an average of over 74 for Ranji champions Mumbai this season. Interestingly, Jaffer today also became the leading run-getter in Irani Cup history with more than 1000 runs to his credit. Save for Gambhir's axing, the batting line-up has not been tinkered with and Sachin Tendulkar, Virat Kohli, Chetshwar Pujara were automatic choices. Struggling for a while, the 39-year-old Tendulkar prepared in right earnest for the series with an unbeaten hundred for Mumbai in the Irani Cup. The pace attack would be spearheaded by Ishant Sharma with Bhuvneshwar, Ashok Dinda being the other two fast bowlers.