India's hopes of retaining the No. 1 Test ranking going into the home season suffered a setback as only 22 overs were possible on the first day in wet Port of Spain. Forecast for the second day wasn't great either, and the facilities at the ground came under scrutiny too. The first day's play began half an hour late despite no rain since the evening before the Test, and it was called off as early as 2pm. There is no super sopper at Queen's Park Oval.

Any team will be a tad disappointed with losing two wickets in the first session after choosing to bat on a slow track, but such has been the state of the West Indies batting that they might take this, with the rain being the bonus. Only once in the series have they lost their third wicket after reaching three figures. Kraigg Brathwaite, who has shown the willingness to buckle down, did that job, but he will be disappointed they lost two wickets especially after he and Leon Johnson had seen off the first spells of the opening bowlers.

West Indies will be all the more disappointed because the pitch was really slow after having spent a lot of time under covers because of rain leading up to the Test. It had left the outfield wet enough to delay the start of the Test by half an hour. Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who had cracked open the last Test for India, wasted little time, though, in creating opportunities. In his first four overs, he hit the outside edge of Brathwaite's bat four times: twice the ball fell short, once it travelled in the gap in the slip cordon, and once Virat Kohli dropped it at second slip, seeming to suggest he expected third slip KL Rahul to go for it.

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Sometimes I am left to wonder if the WICB entered into some kind of agreement with the Indian Board,to compensate them for the abandoned tour to India. I wonder if we did not agree to surrender the series and therefore selectors were asked to pick the worse players to face India, so they could clime to first place? I mean to see them not play young Joseph in his home island of Antigua, then on the fast wicket of Jamaica, and played him St. Lucia where he was probably the best bowler and then drop him for the Trinidad test is puzzling. Also, to see how they brought in Hope against Australia and persisted with him though he kept failing, but to see him in a practice match against the Indian team, just days before the match where he got 108 not out, while Johnson only got 2; yet Hope was dropped from the team and replaced by Johnson. It's like they punished Hope for scoring runs which I am quite sure was a confidence booster, while Johnson was rewarded for failg.

In reply to sandisha

Well, this is the reason why India badly wanted to have the series. They knew it's an opportunity of easy cake walk to world #1 ranking. Did the WICBC conspired on India's plan?
I don't think so!