Will India show West Indies the door at Indore in the 4th ODI?

08 December, 2011

Indore will host the 4th ODI between India and West Indies and it would be a game of nerves. While India would try to wrap up the series, the buoyant West Indies will try to level the series.

THE WIN at Motera has been a morale booster for the visitors and they would be taking the new found confidence with them to Indore to try and settle the score, a score of 2-2 is certainly what they would be looking for.

The West Indies would, of course, have to plan taking into consideration the absence of Darren Bravo, a key player who is injured. He had to retire hurt midway in the 3rd ODI.

However, they have other match winners in their team – like Ravi Rampaul, who can be a handful and also Keiron Pollard who is yet to dazzle. Who knows, he might have kept his fireworks reserved for display in Indore.

On the Indian front, the lack of form in the top order is evident, neither the captain Virender Sehwag nor his Delhi partner Gautam Gambhir have managed to score while Parthiv Patil has been unpredictable. The same is true with Suresh Raina and Virat Kohli. Rohit Sharma is the only one who has been scoring runs mostly in the company of tail-enders.

A bright spot in an otherwise gloomy situation for India is the return to the folds of Irfan Pathan. He is an all-rounder and would be seen in action after a long gap of nearly two and a half years. It would be interesting to see how he measures up to the challenge.

In my opinion, the scales are evenly balanced and the winner of the 4th ODI would be the team that has nerves of steel.