India's Predicted Playing XI against Windies for 1st T20I
India sealed the Test series against the Windies in an emphatic way. But after the one-sided Test outings, the hosts were surprised by visitors competitiveness in white ball cricket. What was supposed to be an irrelevant and unmatched affair, turned out to be a hard-fought and nerve-racking affairs until the third ODI. After that, the Indian camp, boosted by the comeback of their senior bowling pair were on another level and conquered the visitors to win series by a hefty 3-1 scoreline.
With the fifty-overs fixtures done and dusted, the Men in Blue now gear up to host the Caribbean side in the shortest format of the game, with the first T20I set to be played at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Sunday, November 4.
After the conclusion of the second ODI, the Indian selection panel revealed a 16 member squad for the T20I series against the West Indies, which took the cricket fans by storm as India's captain cool Mahendra Singh Dhoni was not considered.
Apart from him Virat Kohli has been rested for the series, while Rohit Sharma will bear captaincy duties in his absence and this will be his fifth full time assignment as skipper.
Squad for West Indies T20I Series : Rohit Sharma (Skipper), Shikhar Dhawan, Lokesh Rahul, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Manish Pandey, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant (wk), Krunal Pandya, Washington Sundar, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah, Khaleel Ahmed, Umesh Yadav and Shahbaz Nadeem.
With the first T20I coming up at the Eden Gardens in a couple of days, India would like to take early honours in the short series. Though they will be happy with their performance in the third one, they know that one can't take the Windies team lightly especially after their performance in ODI series.
So without much ado, let's take a look at India's predicted playing XI for the fourth Test.
Top Order
#1 Rohit Sharma
Rohit Sharma's consistency in the zrecent past and ability to rack up the big scores put him well ahead of other openers in the world. The Indian T20 skipper is on the roll at the moment and proved to be the core of their batting line-up.
In the recently concluded ODI series against the same opponents, he amassed 389 runs comprising two centuries and a fifty. While is coming off an impressive 56 ball hundred in his previous T20 game against England. The way he is playing at the moment, the skipper is no less than nemesis for the opposition side.
#2 Shikhar Dhawan
The Gabbar of Indian cricket, Shikhar Dhawan, is likely to open the batting with skipper Rohit. The opener has not been in the best of form in recent times and failed to score a big one after the conclusion of Asia Cup 2018, while he managed just 19 runs in the T20I against England.
Though he might get a chance in the first T20I on the basis of his starts in ODI series against same opponents. The left-hander managed respective scores of 4, 29, 35, 38 and 6 in five ODI's. Despite getting a go-ahead for the first T20, the batsman must put his best one forward, else he might be asked to make way other aspirants in upcoming fixtures.
#3 KL Rahul
Lokesh Rahul is one of few pure T20 entertainers is likely to feature in the opening fixture of T20 segment. The Karnataka wicketkeeper-batsman has not been able to make his way into the playing XI during the ODI series but is expected to break into the top order on the basis of his performance in Ireland and England, where he plundered 70 against Ireland before scoring an unbeaten century against England. He will be eager to make full use of the opportunity and solidify his stance for upcoming fixtures.