Sachin Tendulkar has made himself available for selection, going against doctors' orders and a two-week rehabilitation programme for a "noble cause".

The 14-man squad was announced in Kolkata by BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya. The side was picked by selectors Kiran More (India), Asantha de Mel (Sri Lanka) and Farooq Ahmed (Bangladesh) following the consultation of Pakistani selector Wasim Bari over the phone.

It contains six Indians, five Sri Lankans, two Pakistanis and one Bangladeshi.

The selection of Tendulkar comes after he was advised to rest from all first-class cricket and not pick up a bat for two weeks by physiotherapist Andrew Leipus. Tendulkar ignored this advice, phoning the selectors to indicate his eagerness to participate in the match, but may be limited to the much less strenous autograph signing - all of which will see the money raised from merchandise, memorabilia and donations skyrocket.

"If necessary he may field or bowl in the match," Dalmiya said.

The major talking points of the selection will be the selection of only two players from Pakistan (Yousuf Youhana and Shoaib Akhtar) - an argument that may be justified by the fact that India and Sri Lanka were the most hard-hit areas. Certainly the likes of Salman Butt and Mohammad Sami can consider themselves unlucky to miss out.

The token selection of Alok Kapali may also baffle some; Kapali, a young hard-hitting all-rounder from Bangladesh, was recently dumped from the national side after a poor ICC Champions Trophy performance, but due to the unavailability of his more established team-mates who will be playing a Test against Zimbabwe at the time, Kapali and Tushar Imran, who belted a century against Zimbabwe in the recent tour match, were the two obvious choices.

Those two points aside, the selection seems fair and the team looks very competitive on paper.

Roll on January 10!

Asian XI squad: Sourav Ganguly (India, captain), Sanath Jayasuriya (Sri Lanka), Virender Sehwag (India), Marvan Atapattu (Sri Lanka), Rahul Dravid (India), Yousuf Youhana (Pakistan), Alok Kapali (Bangladesh), Kumar Sangakkara (Sri Lanka), Chaminda Vaas (Sri Lanka), Shoaib Akhtar (Pakistan), Zaheer Khan (India), Anil Kumble (India), Muttiah Muralitharan (Sri Lanka), Sachin Tendulkar (India).