Why Suryakumar Yadav opened for India wearing Arshdeep Singh's jersey in 2nd T20I vs West Indies

The Indian team continues to experiment and Suryakumar Yadav walked out to open the innings once again with Rohit Sharma. However, the right-hander was donning the jersey of Arshdeep Singh. As soon as the image popped up on the screen, it became a huge talking point on social media as fans wondered the reason behind the jersey swap. It needs to be mentioned here that the start of the match on Monday had to be pushed back by 3 hours owing to the delay in the arrival of ‘crucial team luggage’. This logistical issue could be one of the reasons why Suryakumar could be wearing Arshdeep’s jersey in the match.  

The match was slated to start at 8 PM IST, but was initially pushed back to 10 PM. However, the delay in the arrival of luggage saw the match eventually get underway at 11 PM. It could well be possible that Surykumar’s luggage hadn’t arrived in time before the start of the match. As for the second T20I is concerned, Obed McCoy was the star of the show as he picked up 6 wickets for 17 runs in 4 overs to restrict India to just 138 runs. However, the pitch was sluggish and West Indies never found momentum and despite the half-century by Brandon King, the match went down to the final over. Avesh Khan was trusted with the ball, but he conceded a six and four as Devon Thomas sealed the game with a 31 off 19. “It was not enough runs on the board for us. We didn’t bat well. Pitch was playing quite nicely but we didn’t apply ourselves. But that can happen,” captain Rohit Sharma said at the end of the match. On the issue of handing the ball to Avesh instead of Bhuvneshwar Kumar for the last over, Rohit said that he wanted to trust a young bowler to respond to the pressure scenario and deliver the goods. “We know Bhuvneshwar, what he brings to the table, but if you don’t give opportunity to Avesh or Arshdeep you will never find out what it means to bowl at the death for India,” he added.