NEW DELHI: Social media has found a fun new way to bring the 1980s back, with AI turning modern-day pictures into vintage portraits. The trend has now reached the Indian cricket team, with several players enjoying a hilarious surprise ahead of their T20I series against Afghanistan in Delhi.

Axar, Abhishek and Bumrah join the fun

Two days before the series, the Indian players gathered at their hotel for a photo session. But before it began, they found a table filled with AI-generated pictures of themselves.The portraits, featured in a video shared by the BCCI, showed the players in classic 1980s looks, complete with bell-bottom jeans, big sunglasses and retro hairstyles.India allrounder Axar Patel and Abhishek Sharma picked up the portraits and burst out laughing as they showed them to their teammates. Jasprit Bumrah also joined in the fun.Sanju Samson, Washington Sundar, Shreyas Iyer, Tilak Varma and Shivam Dube checked out their retro pictures and appeared amused by their new 1980s avatars.

Ishan Kishan embraces his retro avatar

Ishan Kishan, who recently led East Zone to Duleep Trophy glory, fully embraced the retro look. He held up his AI-generated picture, sang and posed for the camera as his teammates enjoyed the moment.Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Yash Thakur and Ravi Bishnoi also broke into smiles after seeing their 1980s avatars.

India vs Afghanistan T20I series

India and Afghanistan will face each other in a three-match T20I series, starting Sunday at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Delhi.The second and third T20Is will be played on Tuesday and Thursday at the same venue.