India vs West Indies: Slow and steady works for Yuzvendra Chahal

Yuzvendra Chahal was left out of the T20 World Cup squad in favour of Rahul Chahar, the ostensible reason given for his exclusion was the slower speed that he bowled at. "You want a spinner who can bowl with more speed. Recently we have seen Rahul Chahar bowling with speed. Our view was we need a spinner who can find the grip off the surface at a quicker speed and while we had a lot of discussion on Chahal, we eventually went with Rahul Chahar." These were chief selector and former India pacer Chetan Sharma's words.

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For a team that was coming from a high of beating England in the T20 series at home, it was a disappointing performance as there were too many soft dismissals as they crashed to 176 all out in 43.5 overs. That total too was possible largely to the skill of the highly dependable Jason Holder and the

While Chahal admitted later that news of his exclusion made him skip dinner, the reason given by Sharma would have probably made him skip next day's breakfast too. As is well documented now, the move backfired in a tournament where wrist spinners did very well. With his social media posts, the diminutive and slightly built Haryana leggie and a former junior national chess player, gives the impression that he is a fun-loving, non-serious person. But there is a lot of thought that goes into his game. His dismissals of West Indies power players, keeper-bat Nicholas Pooran and captain Kieron Pollard off successive deliveries at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Sunday were indicative of that thought that he puts into his bowling.

Having already seen off-spinner Washington Sundar get generous purchase from a dryish looking surface off