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The West Indies made an unexpected change to their settled opening pair for what has turned out to be a literally pointless match against India here today in the Coca-Cola Singapore Challenge.

To accommodate the Jamaican left-hander Wavell Hinds for his first One-day International, they omitted Sherwin Campbell, whose 63 in Thursday's victory over Zimbabwe was topscore, and promoted Shivnarine Chanderpaul from No. 5 to his previous position to open with Ridley Jacobs, a partnership of left-handers.

Nixon McLean, the one fast bowler of the five left out of Thursday's match, was also chosen in the 12. But there was no place for Adrian Griffith, the tall left-handed batsman who is yet to get a game.

In both forms of the game, the opening position has been the most problematic. In the last 22 One-day Internationals, the West Indies have used nine different pairs, involving Philo Wallace, Clayton Lambert, Stuart Williams, Junior Murray, Chanderpaul, Campbell and Jacobs. Today's will be the 10th combination.

Campbell and Jacobs have been comfortably the most successful. Five of their nine partnerships since Jacobs took over when Chanderpaul fell ill against Australia in the Caribbean last April have been 83, 81, 99, 67 and 114 (on Thursday).

India's victory over Zimbabwe yesterday meant today's contest was little more than a preview of Tuesday's final that will now be between the same teams. It is strange, all the same, that the selectors chose to disrupt a settling pairing.