Carlos Braithwaite will bring fans into the stadium - Delhi Daredevils CEO
Carlos Braithwaite. Twitter

West Indies star Carlos Brathwaite has made it clear that he has not declined to feature in West Indies’ upcoming ODI series against Pakistan in order to join his Indian Premier League side Delhi Daredevils this week.

With West Indies’ chances of securing an automatic World Cup qualification hanging in balance, the three-match ODI series against Pakistan is very crucial. However, the absence of Brathwaite from the 13-man squad raised speculations that the big-hitting all-rounder skipped the series to play in the cash-rich league.

But the World T20 hero,  who led West Indies in the four-match T20 series against Pakistan, took to Twitter to make it clear that he is arriving early in India just because he was dropped from the ODI squad.

“Just to clear up an obvious misunderstanding, I was omitted from the ODI squad, hence my early arrival for IPL. All the best to ODI team,” he tweeted.

Earlier, West Indies head coach Stuart Law had made it clear that the all-rounder was omitted only because the team management wanted to give him the chance to work on few aspects of his game.

 

“We just thought the opportunity was there for Carlos to go away and work on a few aspects of his game,” Law had said. “Namely his fitness and his bowling, getting back bowling to how he wants to bowl.”

“He has been left out for those reasons and it’s just coincided that the IPL is there and we have no cricket after this ODI series, and he hasn’t been part of the last Test series,” he had added.

Meanwhile, Delhi Daredevils will begin their campaign against Royal Challengers Bangalore on April 8.