India win toss, decide to bat in opening Test

Ahmedabad, Nov 4 (PTI) India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni
won the toss and elected to bat in the first Test against New
Zealand at the Sardar Patel Gujarat Stadium in Motera in the
west Indian city of Ahmedabad Thursday.
India brought fit-again batsmen V V S Laxman and Gautam
Gambhir back into the team after they missed the second and
final Test against Australia at Bangalore last month.
However, Ishant Sharma, who also was absent for the
previous Test, was left out and S Sreesanth retained in his
place.
New Zealand capped 20-year-old batsman Kane Williamson
and 23-year-old fast bowler Hamish Bennett while leaving out
experienced batsman Martin Guptill.
Teams:
India: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (Capt), Virender Sehwag,
Gautam Gambhir, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, V V S Laxman,
Suresh Raina, Harbhajan Singh, Zaheer Khan, Pragyan Ojha, and
S Sreesanth.
New Zealand: Daniel Vettori (Capt), Ross Taylor, Brendon
McCullum, Jesse Ryder, Gareth Hopkins (wk), Kane Williamson,
Chris Martin, Tim McIntosh, Jeetan Patel, Bradley John
Watling and Hamish Bennett.
Umpires: Kumar Dharmasena (Sri Lanka) and Steve Davis
(Australia).
Third umpire: Shavir Tarapore (India)
Fourth umpire: Sameer Bandekar (India).
Match Referee: Ranjan Madugalle (Sri Lanka). PTI