India vs West Indies: Just four days after thrashing England in their own backyard, India are set to take on the beleaguered West Indies for a 3-ODI series, starting Friday, with all three games to be played at the Queen’s Park Oval, Port of Spain, Trinidad. Soon after, on July 29, the 5-match T20I series between the two sides – which will be played at three venues: Trinidad, St Kitts and Florida (USA) – will commence.
Hosts West Indies, on other hand, are coming off a 3-0 whitewash handed to them at home by Bangladesh last week. Therefore, they are not taking any chances even against a second-string Indian unit and have named a full-strength squad with former skipper and star all-rounder Jason Holder returning to the ODI eleven after being rested from the Bangladesh series.
Shikhar Dhawan will lead Team India in the ODI series
Whereas India have sent a second-string squad, to be led by Shikhar Dhawan, keeping in mind the workload of the other all-format stars – skipper Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Rishabh Pant and Hardik Pandya have all been rested and KL Rahul is recovering from an injury.
The West Indies Cricket Broad revealed the trophy – “CG United ODI Series, Powered by Goldmedal” – on the eve of the first ODI and it has got some hilarious reactions from fans. The trophy is quite unusual and weird; it isn’t the normal Cup or Plate – but kind of a “Snake” or “Worm” with a “crystal ball” laying on its body as fans are putting it.
Here, check out the ODI trophy for the India-West Indies series:
Latest addition to the list of weird trophy designs ! #WIvIND #CricketTwitter pic.twitter.com/JNFSoiJfVc
— Moinak Das (@d_moinak) July 22, 2022
Expectedly, fans came up with a series of amusing takes and names for this uncanny ODI trophy.
Here are some of the hilarious fan reactions to the trophy:
The winner gets a.. snake? https://t.co/bpZxcIbVk7
— Sarah Waris (@swaris16) July 22, 2022
Babaji ka….. https://t.co/tFHpBPgG2H
— ɐslɐɯ (@pitchinginline) July 22, 2022
https://t.co/FnU589NfBr pic.twitter.com/BiFbMDXkZD
— Sa. Gomesh | ச. கோமேஷ் (@SaGomesh) July 22, 2022
WTF is that!!
#WIvIND trophy. https://t.co/esReN0lsGr
— Jahir-ul (@Zuheb_786) July 22, 2022
Nagin https://t.co/QMSN2iu7WU
— Umar Iqbal ® (@MrUmarIqbal) July 22, 2022
I’ll be very disappointed if they name that anything other than Naagin Trophy. https://t.co/jVMZgIiJk2
— Akash Kumar Jha (@Akashkumarjha14) July 22, 2022
Who’s the sponsor? Sandals?
— Sasta Tridev (@sastatridev) July 22, 2022
This trophy looks like ascaris( a round worm)
— Shibayan
(@iamshibbss) The hook
— Rajaditya Ghosh (@rajadityax) July 22, 2022
Meanwhile, stand-in India captain Shikhar Dhawan, who is leading India for the second tour after having captained a second-string side last year to Sri Lanka, said he is excited to lead a young bunch of players and share his experience with them, especially helping them on mental aspects of international cricket.
“I’m very excited. Whenever I get a chance to work with the youngsters, I feel I can share my experience with them. Everyone does skill work, but I like to speak about the mental aspect and bring an impact to their games,” Dhawan said.
Here are the squads of both the teams for India vs West Indies ODI series:
India Squad: Shikhar Dhawan (c), Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shubman Gill, Deepak Hooda, Suryakumar Yadav, Shreyas Iyer, Ishan Kishan (wk), Sanju Samson (wk), Ravindra Jadeja (vc), Shardul Thakur, Yuzvendra Chahal, Axar Patel, Avesh Khan, Prasidh Krishna, Mohammed Siraj, Arshdeep Singh.
West Indies Squad: Nicholas Pooran (c), Shai Hope (vc & wk), Shamarh Brooks, Keacy Carty, Jason Holder, Akeal Hosein, Alzarri Joseph, Brandon King, Kyle Mayers, Gudakesh Motie, Keemo Paul, Rovman Powell, Jayden Seales.
