Virender Sehwag pledges inputs for team

NEW DELHI: Virender Sehwag does not hanker after Test captaincy and the swashbuckling opener says as a senior member of the squad, he would keep giving his inputs to whoever leads the side.
    
While ODI and Twenty20 captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni is the overwhelming favourite to take over the Test reins from Anil Kumble in the future, a section of former players believe Sehwag might be the right choice for the job.
    
The Delhi batsman, however, made it clear that he does not crave for the job and would keep helping the team as a senior member.
    
"As a senior member, I would keep giving my suggestions. I suggested something to Kumble in Perth and it clicked. Likewise, I would keep giving my suggestions and it won't have anything to do with whether I'm the skipper or not," Sehwag said here on Friday on the sidelines of a TV channel programme.
    
In the Perth Test, Sehwag had asked Kumble to persist with Ishant Sharma, who was off-colour till then, and the move paid off with the Delhi speedster removing Ricky Ponting.
    
Told about the view of some of the former players who would have liked to see him as the next Test captain, Sehwag said, "It's their opinion."
    
Sehwag said he had fully recovered from an ankle injury and was looking forward to the home series against Australia.
    
"In absence of any cricket in the entire month of September, we got time to work on our fitness. My ankle is perfect now and by the time we play against Australia, all other players would also be in the peak of their fitness level," he said.

Sehwag also threw his weight behind the senior players and said people should not write them off after one bad series.
    
"See, Sachin (Tendulkar), Rahul (Dravid), Sourav Ganguly and (VVS) Laxman are great players. Each of them have been around for more than a decade and have delivered whenever the team required, year after year.
    
"People should not write them off after just one bad series. Remember I had a full one year of bad patch?" he said.
    
Sehwag's consistent form places him higher above the senior players but the star batsman didn't read much into that.
    
"See, maybe I have done better than these guys in a particular series but they are great players and I feel very small in comparison to them," he said.
    
Sehwag also took the occasion to share his joy at being named in the ICC World Test Team of the Year.
    
"It felt really good to be part of the elite squad. I'm also happy that Dhoni and Yuvraj (Singh) also won ICC awards. I think the youngsters in the country would be motivated by their achievement and follow in their footsteps," Sehwag said.     

Sehwag himself has been a guiding force for many of his Delhi teammates but the batsman said it was only expected that as a senior player, he should guide the juniors.     

"All national team players are also role models for their respective states. Of late, a number of Delhi players have made it to the national team, which makes me happy.
    
"As a senior player, my job is to help and guide them, which I'm doing. I hope some day we will have 6-7 players from Delhi in the national team," he added.