Daily Times

FORT LAUDERDALE, United States: West Indies’ hopes of marking Carlos Brathwaite’s first game in charge of the Twenty20 team with a win suffered a major blow when destructive opener Chris Gayle was ruled out of Saturday’s clash against India.

Gayle, who has been plagued by back and hamstring problems in recent times, sits out the first of two back-to-back T20s to be played at the Lauderhill ground this weekend. Brathwaite, the big-hitting hero of the West Indies’ World Twenty20 victory over England in Mumbai earlier this year, has replaced Darren Sammy as captain.

For India, KL Rahul opens the batting instead of Shikhar Dhawan while Stuart Binny comes into the starting line-up. India skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni won the toss and chose to field.

West Indies: Johnson Charles, Evin Lewis, Andre Fletcher, Marlon Samuels, Lendl Simmons, Kieron Pollard, Andre Russell, Dwayne Bravo, Carlos Brathwaite (capt), Sunil Narine, Samuel Badree

India: Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, MS Dhoni (capt), Stuart Binny, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja,Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar

   Umpires: Nigel Duguid (WIS) and Joel Wilson (WIS)

   TV umpire: Leslie Reifer (WIS)

   Match referee: Ranjan Madugalle (SRI)