India wins toss and opts to bat against West Indies in the 2nd cricket test

By Canadian Press on October 9, 2025.

NEW DELHI (AP) — Shubman Gill won the toss for the first time in seven games and decided his India lineup would bat first Friday in the second cricket test against West Indies.

Gill, who took over India’s test captaincy ahead of the tour of England, lost all five tosses in that series as well as in the first match of this series.

India fielded an unchanged lineup from the first test, where it won by an innings and 140 runs to start the two-match series.

That was the first time in 15 years that India played a home test without Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma or Ravichandran Ashwin.

Kohli and Sharma have since been selected in India’s ODI squad for the tour of Australia later this month. Shubman Gill has also been named ODI skipper, replacing Sharma this past week.

West Indies made two changes from the first test – medium pacer Anderson Phillip was called in for Johann Layne, and Tevin Imlach replaced Brandon King in the batting lineup.

West Indies has not beaten India in their last 26 tests – home or away – stretching back to 2002.

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Lineups:

India: Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudharsan, Shubman Gill (captain), Dhruv Jurel, Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj.

West Indies: Tagenarine Chanderpaul, John Campbell, Alick Athanaze, Tevin Imlach, Shai Hope, Roston Chase (captain), Justin Greaves, Jomel Warrican, Khary Pierre, Anderson Phillip, Jayden Seales.

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AP cricket: https://apnews.com/hub/cricket

The Associated Press