India's upcoming Tour of The West Indies

The last time India played the West Indies in 2001-2002, we played 5 tests, of which we drew two, lost two, and won one. And the losing streak against the West Indies at the West Indies has been a recurring nightmare for the blue caps.

I remember as a young kid back in the nineties, the India at West Indies series in 1996-97 was called the Calypso series, but such was our performance that it prompted an Indian writer to dub it the "Collapso series." On the same note, our series in South Africa was a similar failure, and while its actual name was the "Safari Series", for India it was actually the "Sufferi series."

The mighty West Indies are but a shadow of what they used to be. Heck, the only time India has won a test series in Windies was wayy back in 1971, when we won one, and drew four. That was when Sunny Gavaskar scored a total of 774 runs despite missing the first test. He finished the series with an average of 154.80. Well, since then, we havn't even come close to beating the WI. They say India has always been tigers at home, minnows abroad, and for my young, fragile mind, it was very close to being true. It seemed to me that we could never win away from our domestic borders.

India won the Cricket World Cup in 1982 right? And in heroic fashion too, so one would hope that after one year, they would still be considering a cricket powerhouse strong enough to take on anybody. But I believe the West Indies had revenge on their mind. Heck it was the first time that somebody other than them won the Cricket World Cup! So the West Indies was playing with the greats like Gordon Greenidge, an old but still fighting Clive Lloyd and Michael Holding led its bowling attack. For India, Kapil Dev had just taken over the reins from Gavaskar, but despite his heroics, India lost three of the six tests, drawing the other three, and it was even sadder in the one day internationals. We got blanked in the 5 match ODI's.

I could spend all day looking at cricket history on the Cricinfo site. Thats where I get all my data from, thats where I read most of the Cricket opinion pieces, and yes, I would prefer its live commentary over others. Check out the time line of the India-West Indies cricketing history.

Coming back to modern times, West Indies just completed their ODI whitewash of the lowly Zimbabwe, beating them 5-0 in the 7 game series. But its Zimbabwe, and I don't think they have hit the bottom of the barrel yet. So playing India will be a major shift in their level cricket, but they will still go to the field aware of the fact that India hasn't won there in more than thirty years! Plus the World Cup is coming up next year to be played in the West Indies, and it is important for their team to go in with guns blazing, to play the strong host, and with things looking up again for them, they will try to do just that. Brian Lara is the captain again, and Chanderpaul is back to performing better after the burden of captaincy is off his shoulders. Chris Gayle is an impressive player, and I think the Windies have always had solid seamers amongst them.

Not that India is doing that bad either. There was a time when Sachin would get injured and the whole team would take a sick leave with him, but we have come a long way since. Now we win without Sachin! India has always boasted of strong batting, and in recent times its only been augmented with class players. Dravid's a good captain, hes tough and hes a fighter. Yuvraj Singh is a quality vice captain. Kaif needs to get his groove back, and a good performance from him is long overdue. Of course, then comes the new posterboy of Indian Cricket, the man from Ranchi, Mahendra Singh Dhoni. Remember when I had said how proud I was that UP had 4 players on the national squad, I am still proud, and It will a pleasure to see this small town India team (apart from the UP men and Dhoni from Ranchi, theres Sreesanth, only the second Keralite to play for India). So its a pretty youngblooded Indian team, with a fresh pace attack and inshallah, once we are done with the series, we will have altered the statistics book. Meanwhile, on the Kingston streets, India will whip us 'maan', say public.

Heres what Michael Holding has to say.

India have the firepower to get the job done

This will be a completely different kettle of fish for West Indies. While Zimbabwe linger at the bottom of both Test and ODI rankings, India have been proving their worth in both forms of the game.

Sure, West Indies have dominated the present series but Zimbabwe have not been outclassed to the degree you would have expected considering that they are without their best players. And that is good reason for West Indian fans to be a bit skeptical about the upcoming contest.

Fans in the Caribbean know a lot about captain Rahul Dravid and would have seen a bit of Virender Sehwag and at least heard of the recent exploits of Yuvraj Singh. But add to those the hard-hitting Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Mohammed Kaif and the two young guns Suresh Raina and Ramesh Powar and you get the idea that the West Indian bowling attack could be thoroughly tested this time around.

Yuvraj Singh has developed tremendously over the last 12 months and is now the finished article, and Raina and Powar look to be two young batsmen going places but Dhoni is the destroyer. He is a powerful man who could make these comparatively small West Indies cricket grounds look like indoor arenas and perhaps it would not be a bad idea if they were because, if he is not dismissed cheaply, the West Indies Cricket Board could end up with an unusually high equipment bill for lost cricket balls.

It should not all be a one-way street where powerful hitting is concerned, though, as Dravid has acknowledged that the West Indies batting line-up is not one to be sniffed at. "Any team that has players of the quality of Brian Lara, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Chris Gayle and Shivnaraine Chanderpaul, is going to be a serious batting line-up" is how he put it on his arrival in Jamaica and that cannot be denied.

So, perhaps with such strong batting line-ups in both teams, it will be the team that bowls and fields better that will end up in front. West Indies should just be ahead in the fielding stakes with quick sure-handed players like Dwayne Bravo, Dwayne Smith, Runako Morton and even Chanderpaul from the older brigade in the outfield but the inexperienced bowlers will have their work cut out.

As for the Test series, different disciplines and possibly different personnel will be involved to a degree for both teams. India have not won a Test series in the Caribbean since 1971 and have only won three of the 38 they have contested with 19 drawn, which means they have lost 16.
And while the West Indies will be drawing on past experiences and history to prepare mentally for battle, India will be trying to put those statistics behind them and concentrate on the present.
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For some reason, North America seems pretty high up on ICC's list of target markets. I think its the glow of the dolleritos. Canada is understandable but the US? Fine, I guess as long as the Indian-Americans and people from other asian countries have money to spend, sure, why not? I am sorry, but I can't help but express my narrow thought process: damn sell-outs. BCCI does jack shit in India with all the money it earns, but it will bend over backwards to get some NRI's in the stands.

India-WI ODIs in US, Canada confirmed

Amid concerns about player burnout, the BCCI and the West Indies Cricket Board have decided to play an unscheduled one-day International series in the US and Canada later this year.

The series would be organised almost immediately after India complete a five-match ODI and a four-Test tour of the Caribbean in early July and would be outside the Future Tours Programme unveiled by the ICC earlier this week.

The matches would form a part of a bilateral agreement reached between the two Boards at the recent ICC meeting in Dubai, a West Indies Cricket Board statement said.

WICB, on its part, said the project would be funded by the BCCI which would be repaid later. “Because of current financial difficulties, India will fund this project on the understanding that it will be repaid out of the West Indies’ share of the profits of the series,” the statement said.

“This is the first of a number of joint projects which include the opening of the multi-complex stadium in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and the aggressive expansion of cricket in North America.