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A draw was conducted for the Cricket All Stars on Thursday in Times Square New York, during which 27 players were assigned randomly to both the teams of Sachin's Blasters and Warne's Warriors for a series of three matches.
Sachin Tendulkar and Brian Lara who were widely considered the two best batsmen of their generation were drawn in the same team. Teammates of Sachin also include Sourav Ganguly, Virender Sehwag, and VVS Laxman, Curtly Ambrose, Muttiah Muralitharan, Shaun Pollock, and Glenn McGrath.
Shane Warne’s team included former colleagues Ricky Ponting, Matthew Hayden, Andrew Symonds, along with Wasim Akram, Courtney Walsh and Allan Donald.
Interestingly, 26 of the 27 player were allotted to both the sides, while the last cricketer to be left was Shoaib Akhtar. He joined Blasters after Tendulkar won a coin toss.
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After the draw, Warne said, "We're going to go out there and play as hard as we possibly can, and we're going to win. Simple as that.” According to Warne, that the US public had been responding overwhelmingly and the event would even become annual if things go well.
Batting aside suggestions that the cricket rules were for Americans to follow, he said, "When you take two minutes to concentrate on it, it's actually very simple. We're trying to hit the stumps and they're trying to hit it out of the park. It's not that hard."
The matches were ICC-sanctioned. They will be played on drop-in pitches at baseball fields in New York, Houston and Los Angeles.
Sachin's Blasters: Sachin Tendulkar (c), VVS Laxman, Sourav Ganguly, Virender Sehwag, Brian Lara, Mahela Jayawardene, Carl Hooper, Lance Klusener, Shaun Pollock, Moin Khan, Graeme Swann, Glenn McGrath, Muttiah Muralitharan, Shoaib Akhtar, Curtly Ambrose
Warne's Warriors: Shane Warne (c), Matthew Hayden, Ricky Ponting, Michael Vaughan, Jacques Kallis, Kumar Sangakkara, Andrew Symonds, Jonty Rhodes, Saqlain Mushtaq, Wasim Akram, Daniel Vettori, Courtney Walsh, Allan Donald, Ajit Agarkar
-Sumana
