West Indies asked India to bat on what Jeffrey Dujon described as a “tie-dye t-shirt”, a surface difficult to predict. The patterns on the tie-dye were a little moist, which was accentuated by an early, 9 am start. Dujon also said the pitch for some reason turns more in the first half of the day, which meant it was a no-brainer that West Indies chose to field.
However, India’s captain Virat Kohli said he would have batted first anyway. That meant action right away for Ajinkya Rahane, who came back into the side to replace the rested opener Rohit Sharma. The other rested player, Jasprit Bumrah, was replaced by Umesh Yadav. The most exciting change for India, though, was an ODI debut for left-arm wristspinner Kuldeep Yadav, ahead of Ravindra Jadeja, who had an ordinary Champions Trophy.
West Indies brought back a wristspinner of their own, Devendra Bishoo, to go with the offspin of Roston Chase and Ashley Nurse.
India 1 Shikhar Dhawan, 2 Ajinkya Rahane, 3 Virat Kohli (capt.), 4 Yuvraj Singh, 5 MS Dhoni (wk), 6 Kedar Jadhav, 7 Hardik Pandya, 8 Kuldeep Yadav, 9 R Ashwin, 10 Bhuvneshwar Kumar, 11 Umesh Yadav
West Indies 1 Evin Lewis, 2 Kieran Powell, 3 Shai Hope (wk), 4 Jonathan Carter, 5 Jason Mohammed, 6 Roston Chase, 7 Jason Holder (capt.), 8 Ashley Nurse, 9 Devendra Bishoo, 10 Alzarri Joseph, 11 Miguel Cummins. (ESPNCricinfo)
Sidharth Monga is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo
