After India cruised to victory in the Test series and in the aftermath of the Caribbean squad’s latest round of blood-letting, the sides head for the sport’s newest outpost, the Central Broward Regional Park, the only purpose-built cricket stadium in the US. With India back to coloured clothes, skipper MS Dhoni will take over the captaincy duties for the series, and speaking about the series, Dhoni said that the Windies will be a different team in T20s.
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West Indies can clinch second spot in the International Cricket Council’s official Twenty20 rankings, once they can make a clean sweep of their two-match series against India, starting Saturday.
With an impressive performance in Test matches, India will carry on the confidence. “The support is there regardless.We want to fly the flag high and do our best and give a 110 percent”. “So if the wicket is as good as it was in CPL in a stadium like this, we are in for a treat over the weekend”.
Six matches in the recent franchise-based Caribbean Premier League were played at the $10 million arena while the first full global matches, two Twenty20 games between New Zealand and Sri Lanka, were staged there in 2010. I presume it will be drop-in pitches and such pitches are usually very good. Brathwaite hit Ben Stokes for four consecutive sixes in the final over to help West Indies win the World T20.
“I don’t think there is any other team that is playing cricket the whole year”, Dhoni said.
Thus, Simmons said that it would be an “easy” adjustment for West Indies to make for the eagerly awaited series.
“We prepare for the two days here the same way we would have prepared before”. Obviously we have played together over a long period of time and we had a chat yesterday and today as well.
Previously, the venue – which is the only ICC-certified ODI standard facility in the U.S. – has hosted four T20Is and six matches of this year’s Caribbean Premier League. With India going there, we might see many NRIs turn up and cheer for their team. Once he starts, with either bat or ball, we are in a position of winning. “The more time I spend with him, I get to know him even more as a coach”, Dhoni added.
“This is the first time that I’ll be working with MS”.
For the last decade, and probably longer, administrators in the United States of America have sung a familiar refrain to validate the country’s latent market potential, one that nearly always traces back to every host nation’s most desirable suitor: “If India showed up and played team X here, it would be a sell-out”. Where we get after that, we are happy at that.
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Earlier this year, the West Indies Cricket Board agreed in principle to play the day-night Test after the PCB assured them of a practice match along with training sessions.
