India will play Bangladesh in the first Test match of the two test series at Dhaka. India has never lost to Bangladesh in a test match, and will look to maintain their record whereas Bangladesh will look to continue their winning streak after having demolished the West Indian side last year.
The Indians will be going in to the series with a strong looking side. In fact, it is a surprise that there are 15 players named in the squad, but the side will probably be looking at making some changes around if they deem it necessary.
However, it follows that the openers in Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir will retain their slots at the top of the order. Gambhir had missed out on the previous Test that India had played because of his sister's marriage, and had been replaced by Murali Vijay. Sehwag had incidentally smashed a 292 in that game, and the pair will look to consolidate on their excellent partnership at the top.
Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar and VVS Laxman will all make it to the side as well, along with Yuvraj Singh and Mahendra Singh Dhoni forming an excellent batting line-up. It will be interesting to see who the bowlers will be for India, but if the sub-continent conditions are to be believed, it is hard to see India go into the game with more than two pace bowlers.
Zaheer Khan and Sreesanth will be the two pace bowlers, whereas Harbhajan Singh and Amit Mishra should take care of the spin department. This will be an important series for Mishra, as he will look to make an impression in the very first game with a spinner like Pragyan Ojha waiting in the ranks.
For the Bangladeshis, this is another chance to get a move on. They had a rather difficult tri-series in which they lost all of their four games, and despite knowing that they will be up against the strong Indian side, they will look to make some inroads at least.
They will be led by Shakib al Hasan as Mashrafe Mortaza is still not fit enough to be a part of the side, and will be propped by other spinners in the playing eleven. However, it will be a test of their batting in the series, as they have shown their penchant for scoring some big hits to begin with but have not been able to convert their starts into anything meaningful.
It will be difficult to see the Bangladeshis upset the Indian applecart at this current moment. However, the Indians will need to guard against complacency.
