How Yuvraj's injury could change India's plans

India's Champions Trophy campaign suffered a major setback even before it started with Yuvraj Singh fracturing a finger during a practice session in Johannesburg. The injury will sideline him for six weeks, which puts him in doubt for the home ODI series against Australia. Virat Kohli will replace him in the Champions Trophy squad while Gautam Gambhir takes over as vice-captain.

Yuvraj's absence presents fascinating challenges to a batting line-up struggling to cope with Virender Sehwag's unavailability and the failures of Rohit Sharma and Suresh Raina. Rahul Dravid was recalled as a result of those problems, and his role grows in stature with the current crisis.

There has been a pattern to India's innings since Sehwag's injury: Tendulkar and Gautam Gambhir are solid at the top, MS Dhoni anchors the innings during the middle overs, while Yuvraj provides firepower to propel India to a strong total. That will now have to change.

Yuvraj's injury is likely to most affect Dhoni. Of late Dhoni has adopted a more sedate approach and has almost cut out his big shots. It could be said that even when Dhoni tried to play big shots during the final overs of ODIs, and in tournaments like the World Twenty20 and IPL, he could not pull them off consistently. However, with Yuvraj in the team, Dhoni could play the anchoring role, which he has done brilliantly. Time and again he promoted himself, especially when India made a good start, to steer the side through the middle overs, allowing Yuvraj to flex his muscles at the end.

That worked like a charm but it may change now. Dhoni could be forced to do what he has given up, turning the clock back and playing the aggressive shots that captured the imagination of his fans. It will be intriguing to see what route he takes: Will he bat at No 4 and leave the attacking roles to his younger team-mates, or will he take it up himself?

Dhoni's re-adjustment process could be helped by the presence of Dravid, whose much-discussed - and in some quarters much criticised - comeback couldn't have been timed better. Dravid can play the anchoring role, one that obviously suits him, and it might help him as well. He might have been under pressure earlier to increase the run-rate but now his role will be to bat through the innings. Dravid normally starts slowly but by the end of his innings his strike-rate is usually acceptable. Now, he can afford to start slowly without the added pressure.

Yuvraj's injury could also affect Tendulkar's role. With Dravid at No. 3 and Yuvraj to come, Tendulkar, as he showed recently in Sri Lanka, started to bat more fluently at the top. Because Dravid's strike-rate was likely to be low at the start of the innings, Tendulkar had to bat positively to seize the momentum. But now with Yuvraj missing, will he feel he has to bat through the innings? Will it hamper his fluency?

The good news is that Kohli, Yuvraj's replacement in the squad, is in fine form. He scored 398 runs at an average of 66.33, with two hundreds and two fifties, in the Emerging Players tournament in Australia and is a genuine talent in limited-overs cricket. Kohli was unfairly bracketed as a Twenty20 player; his skills are actually more suited to the 50-over format. He is not a power hitter in the conventional sense, he likes to take his time to settle down but possesses the shots to dictate terms later. Along with Dravid, he can be expected to take the lead during the middle-overs and allow Dhoni, Raina and Yusuf Pathan(or Abhishek Nayar) freedom during the final overs.

Ironically, even if India can compensate for Yuvraj's batting skills, they are likely to miss his left-arm spin. He has taken 12 wickets at 30.91 this year and Dhoni has increasingly used him in ODIs. He has allowed India to get away with just one regular spinner in Harbhajan Singh and his absence is likely to upset the balance of the team.