2nd T20I: Avesh comes in for Bishnoi vs West Indies

Ravi Bishnoi was replaced by pacer Avesh Khan for the second T20I vs West Indies at the Warner Park, Basseterre in St Kitts on Monday. The first game of the five-match series was won by India, who lead 1-0. 

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West Indies captain Nicholas Pooran won the toss and elected to bowl. Keemo Paul and Brooks sit out for the hosts. 

“We gonna have a bowl, wickets look nice and we will try and use our experience. We want to forget that game and believe in our process and execute our plans. Different conditions today and the guys are looking forward to whatever spin/seam attack they have. We have two changes. Keemo Paul and Brooks are out,” Windies skipper Nicholas Pooran said at the toss. 

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Indian captain Rohit Sharma said that the team will look to repeat their all-round show in the first T20I, which the team won by 68 runs. 

“It was quite pleasing for us, the way we played first game. We stuck to our plans and executed it really well. It’s another opportunity for us and we are looking to repeat what we did in the first one. We want the guys to be able to bat anywhere and don’t want them to be batting in specific positions. We want the guys to be flexible, there are two ways to look at it depending on certain players.,” Sharma said. 

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Talking about leg-spinner Bishnoi not playing, Sharma said that the team wanted an extra pacer in the playing 11. 

“We probably read the pitch well in the first game and thought as a team we made the right call to go with three spinners. The dimensions are different here and wanted to get an extra seamer here. Bishnoi misses out unfortunately and Avesh Khan comes in. It’s unfortunate that he misses out but we are trying whatever we can from the team’s perspective.”

India (Playing XI): Rohit Sharma(c), Suryakumar Yadav, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant(w), Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Dinesh Karthik, Ravichandran Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Avesh Khan, Arshdeep Singh

West Indies (Playing XI): Kyle Mayers, Brandon King, Nicholas Pooran(w/c), Rovman Powell, Shimron Hetmyer, Devon Thomas, Jason Holder, Akeal Hosein, Odean Smith, Alzarri Joseph, Obed McCoy