The Sabina Park at Kingston Jamaica will host its second match of the series, and if the first is anything to go by, the pitch will be ideal for batsmen, and merciless for bowlers. That is a pity, for Sabina Park once had the reputation of being amongst the fastest, bounciest pitches in the world. There are some isolated thunderstorms predicted for the day, and it is to be hoped that they don’t affect the match too much.

After the lacklustre World Twenty20 campaign, a win is exactly what the team needed, and Yuvraj gave it to them in style. However, the win has papered over some of the cracks that appear to be deep-rooted. The absence of Sehwag and Tendulkar means the other batsmen have to take more responsibility and apart from Yuvraj and Karthik, not many looked convincing. Gautam Gambhir - who couldn’t put a stroke wrong for the past year and a half ,is wondering where his form has gone, and the short ball is troubling Indian batsmen still. The bowling too looked a little ragged with spearhead Zaheer Khan missing, and it was partly due to luck that India were able to defend their target in the first ODI. In summary, though a win first up was satisfying, MS Dhoni and his boys still have a lot of work to do.

Teams:

West Indies : Chris Gayle(c), Runako Morton, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Dwayne Bravo, Darren Bravo, Denesh Ramdin(w), Jerome Taylor, David Bernard, Sulieman Benn, Lionel Baker, Ravindranath Rampaul, Narsingh Deonarine

India : Dinesh Karthik, Gautam Gambhir, Rohit Sharma, Yuvraj Singh, Mahendra Singh Dhoni(w/c), Ravindra Jadeja, Yusuf Pathan, Harbhajan Singh, Ishant Sharma, Rudra Pratap Singh, Ashish Nehra, Abhishek Nayar, Subramaniam Badrinath, Praveen Kumar, Pragyan Ojha, Murali Vijay