India's pace spearhead Zaheer Khan has sought BCCI's permission to skip the first phase of the West Indies tour. According to a top Board official,Zaheer is keen to play the three Test series but wants to miss the five ODIs and the tour opening T20 game at Sabina Park,Jamaica on June 4. The decision of opting out doesn't come as a surprise since Zaheer has been playing non-stop cricket for a while now. The 32-year-old pacer played the ODI series against New Zealand at home late last year before flying out for the 46-day South Africa tour. With a five-day gap between the World Cup final and the IPL-4 opener,Zaheer has been on the road for the close to five months now. And since the Indian team leaves for West Indies just four days after the IPL-4 final,the pacer wouldnt have the time to rest and recover. His lukewarm show for Bangalore Royal Challengers just reasserts the point. He has informed the Board informally. And before the selection committee meets on May 10 he will be writing to the BCCI secretary. The Board will not force him to play the ODIs and T20 game. India has a bunch of tours lined up and we need a fit Zaheer in England and Australia. If any player asks for rest then there is no harm in it,as earlier too we have given rest to players who have asked for it, the BCCI official said. Though reports of senior players opting out to rest have trickled in,veteran off-spinner Harbhajan Singh has explained he will be available for the entire tour. I have no idea from where the news of senior players opting out of West Indies tour have come in. As far as I am concerned I am available for the tour. I haven't talked to anybody nor has anybody spoken to me. We will be playing three Tests there and I don't want to miss any of those, he said. Recommended for Arjuna The BCCI has recommended pace spearhead Zaheer Khan for the prestigious Arjuna award for his excellent showing in the cricket World Cup. The pacer took 21 wickets to finish the tournament as the joint-highest wicket-taker with If Zaheer wins the award,he will join the likes of Salim Durani,Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi Vijay Manjrekar and team mates Virender Sehwag,Gautam Gambhir,Harbhajan Singh,Sachin Tendulkar amongst others. Gambhir was the last male cricketer to have won the award,in 2009,while womens pacer Jhulan Goswamy received the honour last year.
