Indian Cricket Team has landed in the West Indies for the 4 test series to mark the start of their fresh season. A season where they will play a lot of test matches in the coming months. So this tour becomes an important landmark for them as the performance here will set the mood and tone for the bigger challenges to follow.
The Indian squad is full of promise while the West Indian squad is young and high in potential. To many, this tour may seem like an easy one while to those who understand cricket know that taking this West Indies tour lightly may just be the undoing of the Indian team. Those taking it lightly, have their reasons though. Champion players like Gayle, Dwayne Bravo, Darren Sammy and more who were seen helping the West Indies team lift the T20 world cup are not a part of the team now. But the West Indies squad chosen for this tour has proven players like Marlon Samuels and Darren Bravo in the middle order, the two Braithwaites who are no mug in their skills, Jason Holder as the captain has good all round options to play with. Add to that the home advantage, the familiar pitches and the home support and this team begins to look potent.
Indian team on the other hand has the star power as always. Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, Ajinkya Rahane, R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja are all proven players and the new coach Anil `Jumbo` Kumble adds even more spice to the composition. This is the Indian team of present and the future and a lot is expected from them. Experts believe that the Indian team is much better than the current West Indian team but dismissing the Windies would be a mistake, considering the fact that Indians have not been the best of travelers historically.
The Indian team has already played two warm up games and 2 things can be derived from them. Firstly the batting has not been smooth where almost all the batsmen have struggled to bat for longer periods and score any substantial runs. KL Rahul has got two half centuries and apart from that there has been no noteworthy contribution. This should be a factor to worry about. Secondly, the bowling has been good from India but from a different side. The fast bowlers have looked wary while the spinners have held their fort on the Windies pitches as well. Jadeja, Ashwin and Mishra have all been amongst the wickets.
The Indian spinners can prove to be the match winners against the inexperienced Windies side but the fast bowlers need to get back into their rhythm as the pitches there might not be as helpful for the spinners. The batsmen on the other hand need to pick their game up as the Windies fast bowlers have always troubled Indian batsmen, especially on West Indian tracks. In all, it should be a great duel between the bat and ball and may the best team win. The first of the four test matches start on the 21st of July.