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Teams which bat second in a T20 match have lost most of the times at Lords. India, in recent times has proved that they are good chasers. Will they take the risk against the tricky nature of the wicket at Lords?

A loss percentage of 67% reflects that chasing in Lord’s is a daunting task. Though a high Castrol Index of 236 makes India the favourite in the match against West Indies, the latter proved against Australia how good they were as chasers. It’s their batting that is powering West Indies in this Championship. Compared to their Batting Momentum of 279, their bowling and fielding performances have been below par if not poor. Bowling Efficiency is reeling at 133. The fielding points accrued from the match against Sri Lanka stood at - 64. That is similar to nullifying Dwayne Bravo’s electric performance against Sri Lanka for which he had earned an Index of 59! Surely West Indies needs to think deep to improve their fielding if they intend to advance beyond the Super 8s.

Indian batting, on the other hand, will face their first test against superior team in this Championship. Bangladesh and Ireland didn’t test the Indian batting line-up. But both the openers Gautam Gambhir and Rohit Sharma look to be in good nick and will exploit the vulnerability in the bowling attack of West Indies. Fidel Edwards has bowled with an economy rate of 12, conceding boundaries off 31 % of his deliveries. Jerome Taylor, Dwayne Bravo and Lendl Simmons have performed better but how they bowl against India would be keenly watched. West Indies would be hoping that skipper Chris Gayle regains fitness. His explosive Batting Momentum of 159 and slow spin will be much needed for the Windies in this match.

Indian bowling is sitting pretty in the hands of Pragyan Ojha and Zaheer Khan who have taken 11 wickets between them at an economy rate of only 6. Ishant Sharma, RP Singh, Harbhajan Singh and the part-timers like Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina provide India lots of options in the bowling.