India in West Indies 2009India will be looking to edge closer to a rare One-day International series victory against the West Indies in the Caribbean before embarking on a well-earned break from the game.
They face West Indies in the last two ODIs of four this coming Friday and Sunday at the Beausejour Cricket Ground here.
India and West Indies shared the first two ODIs last Friday and Sunday at Sabina Park in Jamaica.
The visitors won the opening fixture by 20 runs, and the home team rebounded two days later to secure the second ODI by eight wickets.
On their five previous trips to the Caribbean in bilateral ODI series, India have only once overcome West Indies, and this was 2-1 in a three-match contest seven years ago.
But Mahendra Singh Dhoni's side has a couple of other reasons why they will feel the pressure in the next few days.
Their early exit from the Twenty20 World Cup in England a few weeks ago is still uppermost in their minds, as well as their fans who can be quite demanding, and do not take losing easily.
Dhoni has also identified banishing the demons of India's early exit from the 2007 World Cup in the Caribbean as another objective that will motivate his side.
In both matches, India have looked a below-par version of the side that before coming to the Caribbean had lost only three of their previous 18 matches, and had climbed to No.3 in the ODI World rankings.
They allowed West Indies to get within sight of a challenging victory target of 340 in the first ODI, and then suffered a batting meltdown in the second ODI as their age-old susceptibility to short-pitched and swing bowling were again exposed.
Yuvraj Singh looks to be the only batsman in touch as was evident from his 131 in the first ODI, and some of the strokes he played in his all-too-brief 35 in the second ODI.
Dhoni made 95 in the second match, but he too, has not cut the picture of the commanding figure at the crease that he is known to be.
Questions about fatigue will continue to preoccupy the discussions about India's performance, but they can silence all of the debate with two commanding victories in the next few days.
West Indies will look to repeat their show of force from Sunday at Kingston in the last two matches.
They have named an unchanged squad for the two matches, much to the disappointment of St. Lucians, who were hoping to catch a glimpse of local cricket hero Darren Sammy.
West Indies have won five of the 10 matches they have contested at the ground, and one has finished in a no-result, but they'll be hoping to improve this record.
They would also hope that the Beausejour pitch is not typically easy-paced, so they can again exploit India's meekness against pace, bounce and movement.
West Indies (from): Chris Gayle (capt), Denesh Ramdin, Lionel Baker, Sulieman Benn, David Bernard Jr, Darren Bravo, Dwayne Bravo, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Narsingh Deonarine, Runako Morton, Ravi Rampaul, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Jerome Taylor
India (from): Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt), Subramaniam Badrinath, Gautam Gambhir, Ravindra Jadeja, Dinesh Karthik, Praveen Kumar, Abhishek Nayar, Ashish Nehra, Pragyan Ojha, Yusuf Pathan, Ishant Sharma, Rohit Sharma, Harbhajan Singh, Rudra Pratap Singh, Yuvraj Singh, Murali Vijay
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