Indian High Commission says the issue has been blown out of proportion

A little birdie tells MiD DAY that the Indian High Commission is not upset with the Indian team for their unavailability to attend their party and stick to their original plan of going to a charity function which involved skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni.

"I spoke to a high-ranking official and he told me that, 'the issue was blown out of proportion. We did not want to make a big deal of it. We didn't want the players to be saddled with controversy. We wish the Indian team well,'" said an Indian businessman here yesterday.

Meanwhile, Indian team manager Anirudh Choudhry stressed that he is in touch with the High Commission and the team will attend the function in August.

A member of the Indian tour party said that the High Commission was surprised with the story about the team not attending the function and themselves felt that the controversy was needless.

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What changes should India make for today's second Test against England? Dhoni will not say who will replace the injured Zaheer Khan, but one of the officials for the Test said, "the guy who can win you the Test is sitting in the dressing room."

He was referring to leg-spinner Amit Mishra and felt Dhoni should be brave enough and include Mishra. The official did not get many supporters for his view, but assured us it would make sense. We wait for a bold move.

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A table with empty paper cups, sugar and milk, but no tea or coffee

The Press corps arrived at the ground a good three hours early as compared to Wednesday because captains Dhoni and Strauss were scheduled to address the media after 11:30 am. Badly in need to pep up their systems with either tea or coffee, the writers found only a table with empty paper cups, sugar and milk, but no tea or coffee.

It never arrived.

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Now, for some fun: Fielding coach Trevor Penney to Praveen Kumar at a fielding session: "Ok now this will win the Test match."

Penney throws but Praveen fails to stop it from going to advertisement hoardings.

Penney says again, "this one will win the Test match," and throws. Praveen collects but fails to hit the cone. Test match over, Guys!