The ‘New Jersey’ has several very futuristic and advanced features, such as ultra light, highly absorbent material for extra comfort of wear. It also has a mesh right down the back of the shirt, which allows for excellent breathability which apparently was at the players’ own behest. It took Nike 18 months to develop the new shirt which Captain MS Dhoni laughingly said “won’t get dirty so easily”, though one doubts very much if MSD is over concerned about doing the laundry.
At the unveiling ceremony some of Team India’s erstwhile greats made an appearance wearing some of the older jerseys.
Laxman Sivaramakrishnan came in wearing the 1985 Team India jersey and
Vinod Kambli was seen wearing the sky blue 1997 jersey with the thick tri colour bands on the arm holes.
Venkatesh Prasad was seen wearing the 1998 jersey with Robin Singh bringing up the rear with 1999 jersey with the distinctive diagonal orange pattern right across the front of the jersey.
And then came the present men in blue, skipper
MS Dhoni, pacer
Zaheer Khan,
Yuvraj Singh,
Dinesh Karthik,
Pragyan Ojha and
Rohit Sharma all wearing the brand new Team India colours. They then proceeded to walk the ramp to give a better idea of the design of the new jersey and exchanged some humorous repartee with the master of ceremonies Harsha Bhogle who asked whether the players were planning to go bungee jumping. To this, Dhoni responded with, “I am scared of heights” and that the players were barred from doing so under the terms of their contract. Keeping things in the lighter vein, Yuvraj responded to all the questions posed to him with “Ask Dhoni”. Zaheer Khan also appeared relaxed and confident about being the lead bowler in the side and said he was enjoying the responsibility.
