India vs West Indies, 1st ODI: Form, Venue Record and Match-ups
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Arjun writes the match previews: pitch and conditions, head-to-head records, squad form, and the individual match-ups that tend to decide games. His pieces cover India–Australia ODIs, the IPL playoffs and the World Test Championship final. He writes about cricket rather than wagering. The analysis is there to help readers understand why a match unfolds the way it does, and every preview carries the same caveat: cricket is genuinely unpredictable, and past form guarantees nothing.
India start clear favourites on record and form. They have won 20 of 27 completed ODIs against West Indies since 2015, while West Indies have lost eight of their last ten ODIs. The venue tells you very little: Greenfield has staged two men's ODIs, and they produced first innings of 390 and 104. Shai Hope, averaging 51.5 in ODIs since January 2025, is the visitors' main hope of changing the pattern.
Key Takeaways
- •India have won 20 of 27 completed ODIs against West Indies since 2015; West Indies have won four.
- •West Indies arrive on a 2-8 ODI run over their last ten; India are 5-5 over theirs.
- •Greenfield has hosted only two men's ODIs, so its venue numbers carry almost no weight.
- •Those two matches produced first innings of 104 and 390 — the spread is the story, not the average.
- •Shai Hope is the one West Indies batter in genuine ODI form: 876 runs at 51.5 since January 2025.
- •Kohli, Gill and Rohit have all scored here, but across a combined five innings.
Pitch Report & Conditions
Greenfield has hosted two men's ODIs, in November 2018 and January 2023. The first innings in those matches were 390 and 104 — a spread wide enough that no average drawn from them means anything. What can be said is that the surface has not been a slow, low turner in either game; both results were driven more by conditions on the day and the quality of the bowling than by any settled venue character. Treat pre-match claims about 'how Greenfield plays' with suspicion, including ours.
Weather Forecast
No reliable forecast exists this far out. Thiruvananthapuram and Lucknow are both in play for late-monsoon and post-monsoon interruption respectively; check a forecast on the morning of the match rather than trusting one published weeks ahead.
Head-to-Head Record
62 India-West Indies ODIs are recorded from 2005 onward: India 40, West Indies 18, 4 without a result. Narrowing to 2015 and later sharpens it considerably — 27 matches, India 20, West Indies 4, 3 no-result. The most recent meeting in the archive is 1 August 2023, so neither side has played the other in this format for three years.
| Year | Venue | Winner | Margin |
|---|---|---|---|
| All ODIs (2005-2023) | 62 played | India 40 - 18 | 4 no result |
| Since 2015 | 27 played | India 20 - 4 | 3 no result |
| Last meeting | 1 Aug 2023 | - | 3 years ago |
India Team Analysis
Won 5 and lost 5 of their last ten completed ODIs (25 Oct 2025 to 19 Jul 2026), so the aura is doing more work than the recent record. The batting is where the strength sits: since January 2025, Virat Kohli has 1,035 ODI runs at 64.7, Rohit Sharma 886 at 46.6, Shubman Gill 813 at 50.8 and KL Rahul 522 at 52.2 with a strike rate of 111.1. The bowling is less settled — Harshit Rana leads with 26 wickets at 27.4, and Kuldeep Yadav's 22 have come at 33.3, which is expensive by his standards.
West Indies Team Analysis
Two wins in their last ten ODIs (23 Oct 2025 to 21 Jul 2026), and one of the weaker recent 50-over records among the full members. Shai Hope is carrying the batting almost alone: 876 runs at 51.5 since January 2025, with Keacy Carty next on 814 at 38.8 and a strike rate of 73.9 that tells you how the innings are being built. Jayden Seales is the bowling bright spot at 31 wickets at 21.2. Note their T20I form is a different picture entirely — see the T20I preview.
Key Player Battles
Shai Hope vs India's spin
Hope is the only West Indies batter averaging above 40 in ODIs since January 2025 (876 runs at 51.5). Kuldeep Yadav has taken 22 ODI wickets over the same period but at 33.3, his least economical stretch in years. Whichever of these two is winning at the 20-over mark tends to decide the middle phase.
Jayden Seales vs the India top order
Seales has 31 ODI wickets at 21.2 since January 2025, the best return by some distance in this squad. He is bowling to a top three of Kohli (64.7), Gill (50.8) and Rohit (46.6) over the same window. This is the one genuine mismatch in West Indies' favour on paper.
At this ground specifically
Kohli has 199 runs here at a strike rate of 143.2 without being dismissed, Gill 116 and Rohit 105 — but across a combined five innings in two matches. No current West Indies player has an ODI record at Greenfield at all. These are anecdotes, not evidence.
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Analyst Verdict
India should win, and the honest version of that sentence is that everything except the venue data says so: a 20-4 head-to-head since 2015, four batters averaging above 46 in the last 20 months, and opponents who have lost eight of their last ten ODIs. What the numbers do not support is any confident claim about how this pitch will behave. Two ODIs, ten years apart, producing 390 and 104, is not a venue profile. Anyone telling you Greenfield is a batting track or a bowling track is filling a gap in the data with a guess.
Where these numbers come from
Every legal claim on this page traces to the material below. Primary sources are the statute and government notifications themselves.
- Ball-by-ball match archive for men's ODIs and T20Is(opens in a new tab) — CricsheetPrimary source