A second string Indian team, led by Suresh Raina, left for the West Indies on Wednesday to contribute in a T20, five ODIs and three Test matches. The Indian team panel a between flight to Barbados via London at 0230 hours from the Chhattrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai.
India will play one T20 at Trinidad (June 4) and five-ODIs on June 6 (Trinidad), June 8 (Trinidad), June 11 (Antigua), June 13 (Antigua) and June 16 (Jamaica). India will also participate in a three match Test-rubber that will be held at Jamaica (June 20-June 24), Barbados (June 28-Jul 2) and Dominica (Jul 6-Jul 10).
The Indian squad for the ODIs and the lone T20 is with no nine players who were part of the World Cup winning team under regular skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni. The players absent out consist of Dhoni, Sachin Tendulkar, Zaheer Khan-- who has been rested, the injured Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag and Ashish Nehra and an unwell Yuvraj Singh.
S Sreesanth and Piyush Chawla have been going down. However, Dhoni and Zaheer will join the team for the Test matches along with Laxman, Murali Vijay, Abhinav Mukund, Rahul Dravid, and Sreesanth.
When India last toured the Caribbean Islands in 2006 under Dravid, it shaped history by beating the home team (1-0 in a four match rubber) in a Test series for the first time in 35 years. However, the team will surely look to change the 1-4 defeat it got in the five-match ODI series then.