Chennai T20I: West Indies opt to bat first

Chennai (Tamil Nadu): West Indies won the toss and opted to bat first in the third and final Twenty20 international match against India at the MA Chidambaram Stadium here on Sunday.
India’s stand-in skipper Rohit Sharma shared that had he won the toss, he would have opted to bowl first.

“We are playing with a long batting line-up. We have got (Yuzvendra) Chahal and Washington (Sundar) in place of Kuldeep (Yadav) and (Jasprit) Bumrah. (Ambati) Rayudu and Khaleel (Ahmed) have done really well recently. I try to focus on the process and will try to do the same once again. But for me, it’s more about how the team does,” Sharma said.

West Indies skipper Carlos Brathwaite, on the other hand, said, “The wicket might slow down a bit later on. I think we can defend well as our slow bowlers would come into play. We are going with the same XI.”

The pitch here has a lot of cracks so there are chances that the oddball might skid. However, the dew won’t be a big factor.

The ‘Men in Blue’ have already taken an unassailable 2-0 lead in the series, which makes today’s game a dead-rubber. However, this is only the second T20I and the first international game to be played in this stadium in about 14 months.

Following are the squads for both the sides:

India: Rohit Sharma (C), Shikhar Dhawan, Rishabh Pant, Lokesh Rahul, Manish Pandey, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Krunal Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Washington Sundar, Khaleel Ahmed, Yuzvendra Chahal

West Indies: Shai Hope, Shimron Hetymer, Darren Bravo, Denesh Ramdin (wk), Nicholas Pooran, Kieron Pollard, Carlos Brathwaite (C), Fabian Allen, Keemo Paul, Khary Pierre, Oshane Thomas

[source_without_link]ANI[/source_without_link]