DUBAI–Bat­ting leg­end Bri­an Lara has tipped In­dia to win the Twen­ty20 World Cup but says West In­dies can threat­en once they can avoid the in­con­sis­ten­cy which has plagued them in the past.

While West In­dies will be packed with all their in­ter­na­tion­al stars af­ter se­lect­ing a strong squad last week, Lara said In­dia would en­ter the tour­na­ment with the edge be­cause of home ad­van­tage.

"I think In­dia will win in home con­di­tions," the for­mer Test cap­tain said fol­low­ing an out­ing at the Abu Dhabi In­vi­ta­tion­al golf pro-am here.

"Their play­ers know the pitch­es and they're play­ing good crick­et against the best teams in the world at present in that ver­sion of the game. I would def­i­nite­ly give them top billing.

"But I must talk about the West In­dies. I hope they can pick the best pos­si­ble team be­cause if they do, every oth­er na­tion will be wor­ried."

West In­dies have se­lect­ed the core of the side which stunned hosts Sri Lan­ka in the fi­nal of the 2012 Twen­ty20 World Cup two years ago in at the R Pre­madasa Sta­di­um.

The squad will be led again by all-rounder Dar­ren Sam­my and in­cludes the likes of glob­al su­per­star Chris Gayle, Kieron Pol­lard and An­dre Rus­sell–all fa­mil­iar faces in the ma­jor T20 leagues across the world.

Lara be­lieves once the side can gel and play con­sis­tent crick­et, they would be gen­uine con­tenders at the March 8 to April 3 tour­na­ment.

"Chris Gayle, Dar­ren Bra­vo or Kieron Pol­lard, all these guys when they come to­geth­er, there's a cer­tain chem­istry. I can tell they want to be to­geth­er and pull to­geth­er," the 46-year-old point­ed out.

"But on oc­ca­sions, we know the West In­dies can be very in­con­sis­tent. We can still have the best play­ers and be out in the first round. You nev­er know with the West In­dies."

West In­dies have been drawn in Group 1 along­side Eng­land, South Africa and Sri Lan­ka, along with a yet-to-be-de­ter­mined qual­i­fi­er.

They will un­der­go a prepa­ra­tion camp in Dubai lat­er this month be­fore fly­ing to Kolkata for the two of­fi­cial warm-ups against Aus­tralia and In­dia.

(CMC)