Kumble bats for seniors, rubbishes media scrutiny of 'feb four'

Bangalore, Oct 2 (UNI) Indian captain Anil Kumble today termed the media speculations involving senior players in the team as 'rubbishly' done scrutiny and called for a more respectful debate.

''You need to be a bit more respectful. When people discuss cricketers and players, they need to be handled respectfully,'' Kumble told mediapersons after the four-day camp here.

''If that's done (if scrutiny is done in a respectable fashion), we don't mind scrutiny. When it's done rubbishly and the way it's being quoted, then it hurts,'' the ace leggie said.

Slamming the media speculation over Sourav Ganguly's inclusion for the first two Tests against Australia at home, Kumble said media reports have said a lot of things.

The skipper batted strongly for the senior batsmen in the side saying ''in terms of senior players' performance, they did exceptionally well. It's just one bad series that we had in Sri Lanka and if you go by the (overall) record, I don't think these players have performed badly.'' ''The reason that you had these (good) results in Australia is thanks to the senior batsmen getting those runs. It's never been a problem,'' he added.

UNI MSP ROY RAR RK1605