When two England cricketers, Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid, were asked to select an India-England combined XI, it was clear the task would be tough.
So with tricky decisions to choose between the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Virat Kohli and others -- they were forced to exclude some superstar players.
Virat Kohli, who was one of the biggest stars in Test cricket from the 2010s until his retirement, scoring 9230 runs in 210 Test innings, including 30 hundreds and 31 fifties.
Despite a forgettable 2014 series, he bounced back stronger than ever in 2018, scoring 593 runs including two centuries and three fifties.
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Even Rohit Sharma, despite a slow start to his career became a stalwart of the Indian team, accumulating 4,301 runs in 116 innings, including 12 centuries and 18 fifties.
Both Sharma and Kohli led India to a World Test Championship finals each in 2021 and 2023, but fell short of the final hurdle.
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What is India-England combined Test XI?
In their latest video on the YouTube channel Beard Before Wicket, Ali and Rashid were asked to pick a combined Test playing 11 from both sides throughout their histories.
Among the Indian batters, the trio of Virender Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar and MS Dhoni made it to the top-6 in the batting order of Ali and Rashid.
Joe Root, who usually bats at four for England, made way for Tendulkar and was picked as a number three over the Indian option like Rahul Dravid, which was extensively discussed in the video.
Interestingly, the former India captain Rohit Sharma's name was not even mentioned when they were contemplating the options for the opening slot.
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Below is the playing XI listed:
- Marcus Trescothick
- Virender Sehwag
- Joe Root
- Sachin Tendulkar
- Kevin Pietersen
- MS Dhoni
- Ian Botham
- Anil Kumble
- Graeme Swann
- James Anderson
- Zaheer Khan
The duo also discussed Tendulkar's longevity and Virat Kohli's peak in detail during their team selection but eventually chose the all-time highest scorer, at No. 4 in their team.