IND vs WI: It's a different kind of Test series for Virat Kohli's India

Two-Test series against West Indies that kicks off today gives the Indian team management a chance to get the playing XI right

This year was talked about as being a litmus test for Virat Kohli's captaincy with three important overseas tours for Team India in the season. While Kohli & Co showed great determination to win the final Test under trying conditions at Johannesburg to end the Test series in South Africa 1-2 earlier this year, they lost the five-Test series in England 1-4, albeit in a highly competitive atmosphere.

It was the batting that let India down in both these series. Kohli and the team management also suffered for not getting their combination right. Yesterday, Kohli insisted that the intention was always to play the best XI. "The motive has always been to put the best XI on the park and we have hardly tinkered with the batting order apart from a couple of guys not being in form here and there," said Kohli on the eve of the first Test against West Indies at the Saurashtra Cricket Association stadium here.

In South Africa, Team India dropped vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane to make way for in-form batsman Rohit Sharma, who eventually managed just 78 runs in four innings. During the recent series defeat in England, the Indian think-tank blundered several times. In the first Test at Edgbaston, they played an extra pacer and included just one spinner (R Ashwin) when the pitch was conducive to spin bowling.

The second Test drubbing at Lord's saw an obvious error as the Indian team management decided to play two spinners (Ashwin and Kuldeep Yadav) and only two frontline pacers (Ishant Sharma and Mohd Shami). This, despite the fact that Team India had one full day to rectify their playing XI after Day One was washed out.

"We have utilised the conditions to the maximum. We have picked up wickets because we have played people who are suited to those kind of conditions or pitches. Yes, the batting hasn't been up to the mark and that is why we haven't been able to win in England and South Africa," the Indian skipper lamented. While the forthcoming tour of Australia provides Kohli one final opportunity in the season to better his overseas captaincy record, the two-Test series against West Indies gives the team management a chance to get the playing XI right.

"Definitely, picking bowlers according to what they can bring on the field, on the pitch, has been definitely good for us because we have taken 10 wickets in almost every innings in the last couple of years. Every team want the best playing XI and we understood that changing bowlers was about playing on different pitches and not a case of wanting to do something different every game. It is all about what is in front of you and according to that, what you want to go in with as the best option to take 20 wickets every game," Kohli concluded.

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