Published: Aug 05, 2019, 02:24 PM (IST)
Edited: Aug 05, 2019, 02:24 PM (IST)
The Indian cricket team is back in the West Indies for the third year in a row, continuing a bilateral relationship that has been decidedly one-sided over the past decade.
After taking an unassailable 2-0 series lead in the first two Twenty20 internationals against West Indies in Florida over the weekend, Virat Kohli‘s India will play the final match on Tuesday in Guyana before they teams head into the ODI leg followed by two Test matches.
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This will be India’s seventh series in the West Indies in the last ten years and 11th bilateral contest with them in the same time.
Since July 2009, India have gone to the Caribbean six times. In 2009 they played an ODI series there; they returned in 2010 to contest the third ICC World T20; in 2011, they played West Indies in Tests, ODIs and T20Is; in 2013, just after winning the ICC Champions Trophy in England, India flew to the West Indies for an ODI tri-series; in 2016, Kohli led India in four Test matches in the West Indies; and in 2017, India went from the Champions Trophy final to play ODIs and T20Is versus West Indies.
(READ: Can West Indies prevent India’s clean sweep on return to Caribbean?)
India won the ODIs in 2009, the Tests, ODIs and one-off T20I in 2011, the Test series in 2016 and the ODIs in 2017. West Indies won the solitary T20I played against India in 2017.
In the last ten years, West Indies have toured India four times for bilateral engagements. For Tests and ODIs in 2011 and 2013, for ODIs in 2014 and for a full tour in 2018. India won each series.
(READ: Virat Kohli credits Krunal Pandya, hails ‘outstanding’ Washington Sundar)
So is India vs West Indies the new India vs Sri Lanka?
Between July 2008 and September 2017, India toured Sri Lanka eight times. This encompassed a Test and ODI tour in 2008, an ODI tri-series in 2009, the Asia Cup, a Test series and a triangular in 2010, an ODI and T20I tour in 2012, a Test tour in 2015 and a full tour in 2017. Add in the 2012 ICC World T20 and the Nidahas Trophy in 2018, that becomes eight visits to Sri Lanka.
Of these series played in Sri Lanka, India won the Compaq Cup in 2009, the Asia Cup in 2010 and last year’s Nidahas Trophy. In bilaterals in Sri Lanka, they won ODI and T20I series in 2012, the Tests in 2015 and each format in 2017.
They lost the 2008 Test series, drew the 2010 Tests 1-1, and lost the triangular in 2010.
(READ: With series sealed, possibility for Chahar cousins and Shreyas Iyer?)
In this same time frame, Sri Lanka came to India four times to contest bilateral series: in 2009, 2014, 2016 and 2017. Sri Lanka did not win a single series on Indian soil. Their best result was a 1-1 result in the T20I series of 2009-10.
No team has visited India as frequently in the past decade as Sri Lanka and West Indies, and Indian cricket teams have not traveled anywhere else as often as they have to Sri Lanka and the West Indies in this time period.
What will this tour to the West Indies hold for India?
