Lagatar24 Desk
Dubai, Oct 18: On Monday, the Indian team will face England in a warm-up match before starting their campaign against Pakistan in the T20 World Cup on October 24. This match between both the teams will be played at Dubai ground. In the warm-up match against England, the Indian team will have a great opportunity to find the right team combination. Both the warm-up matches of the Indian team are at different times. The first warm-up match will start at 7.30 pm today and the second warm-up match of Team India will be played at 3.30 pm. This match will be against Australia. Both the matches will be telecast live on Star Sports Network.
There is a constant question mark on Hardik Pandya’s fitness. During IPL Phase-2, Hardik was not seen bowling even an over and it is believed that he will be seen playing as a batsman even during the World Cup. However, if Pandya wants to get a ticket in the playing XI, then he will have to bowl. Also, Hardik is not in a good rhythm with the ball as well as with the bat. Barring one match in Phase II, Pandya could only manage 75 runs at an average of 25 in the entire UAE season.
Star opener Rohit Sharma is also not in form at the moment. His performance in IPL Phase-2 was also disappointing. Only 131 runs came off his bat in 6 innings. In a big tournament like the World Cup, Rohit Sharma’s form matters a lot for Team India. Rohit will have a good chance to return to his form before the match against Pakistan.
In this situation, Captain Kohli will be on the lookout for a better team combination before the start of Super 12. R Ashwin has returned to the T20 team after four years, but his form in IPL Phase-2 was also poor. Rahul Chahar was also dropped from the playing XI of Mumbai Indians after his poor performance. In such a situation, the decision of who will support Ravindra Jadeja as a spinner will be decided in this match.
On the other hand, England will expect Jason Roy and Jonny Bairstow to bat aggressively along with Jos Buttler. If we look at the performance of IPL, then Liam Livingstone and David Malan were seen struggling in the batting. Captain Oen Morgan was a hit as IPL captain, but his performance with the bat was also very disappointing. In 16 innings of the tournament, Morgan scored just 133 runs at a simple average of 11.08.
Going into the warm-up match, both the teams are expected to give much-needed practice to the key players and to find out better team combinations.
