After team India lost the Champions Trophy final to arch-rival Pakistan, the team left to the Caribbean for the limited-overs series of 5 ODIs and one T20I. After the first ODI washed out due to rain, the Indian Cricket Team effortlessly won the second and third ODIs.
But coming to 4th ODI, team India took on a wounded West Indies at Antigua. It was a one-sided series until 3rd ODI. But a major point of discussion before the 4th ODI was if the dominant visitors would give a chance to their talented bench strength in the 4th ODI, which will also decide who wins the series.
Thus, team India officials decided to a chance for the new faces in the series. Yuvraj Singh has been out of touch in the last two games, except his fifty against Pakistan in India’s opening game of the Champions Trophy. He went on to score only 162 runs in his last 8 outings.
Thus, his position in playing 11 for 4th ODI placed a question mark. He scored a 39 in the 3rd ODI, not huge but good enough to bring his confidence back. Despite, he was not included in the XI due to a sore hamstring.
And this was confirmed by Harsha Bhogle on Twitter as he wrote, “So Yuvraj’s hamstring sore enough to warrant a rest. Prudent.”
So Yuvraj’s hamstring sore enough to warrant a rest. Prudent.
— Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) July 2, 2017
Although he has been consistently underperforming, Yuvraj has the backing of skipper Virat Kohli who knows that on his day, Yuvi can fight fire with fire. In place of Yuvraj, Dinesh Karthik has been given a chance. Karthik has been performing well in the domestic seasons that’s why he was chosen as the replacement of Manish Pandey.
Meanwhile, youngster Rishabh Pant is still waiting for his call in the playing XI. Pacer Mohammed Shami and left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja have been included in the squad for Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Ravichandran Ashwin who had a good time in the series thus far.