India will face England in the second T20I to level the series after losing the first T20I by 8 wickets.
Match Timings: Mar 14, 7 PM IST
Team Preview
Team India will continue their T20I series and they play England in the second T20I on Sunday with a comeback approach. The poor batting attitude against the extra seam on the new pitch cost them a match and England took a 1-0 lead in the series. India scored just 22 in the powerplay with losing three wickets which is their second-lowest powerplay score in T20Is. India scored only 124, thanks to a lone effort from Shreyas Iyer with 48-balls 67. England made this task a cakewalk and crossed the line with 27 balls spare.
Indian management surprised everyone by resting Rohit Sharma and the new opening pair couldn’t work out. Kohli will go ahead with the same playing XI. It means India will play with three spinners Axar, Chahal and Sundar. Shardul and Bhuvi will be two front-line pacers. India didn’t understand the pitch and England pacers made good use of the extra seam. They won the vital toss and the bowling unit made the task easier.
KL Rahul and Dhawan both were the leading run-scorer in last year’s Indian T20 League so they will now have the big responsibility to provide a good start. Pandya has been an X-factor in middle-overs and he might be crucial. He also bowled two overs in the last match so India can easily adapt to the conditions by taking him as the 6th bowling option. Iyer played a fine knock under pressure so Suryakumar Yadav has to wait for the T20I cap. Kohli bagged his 14th duck as captain and second consecutive duck against England. The skipper would look for a big score tonight. India have the depth in both batting and bowling and they will look for a comeback. They have lost just two matches in the last one year so India are favourites to bounce-back. Changes are unlikely to happen on Sunday.
Meanwhile, England are motivated after four consecutive T20I wins and they lost just one game since the COVID outbreak. The number one T20 side capitalised the conditions very well after winning the toss and credit goes to the skipper who went for spin in first over and later, introduced pace in a regular basis. Jofra Archer bagged three for 22 and Adil Rashid went for just 14 in a 3-overs spell. The duo was terrific on Friday night. Jason Roy and Buttler provided a good start and we didn’t see any issue in the chase. England are the world’s top T20I side and they have good depth in their batting. Toss will surely play an important role and with the bowling success, they are highly boosted. England will look to make it five out of five tonight to step closer towards a T20I series win against India after a long time.
Pitch Report
Motera’s track is good for batting. There was an extra seam on the pitch and spinners also had some advantage. Batting will be easier later the match progresses. 170-180 is a good score on this track.
Possible XI
India
KL Rahul, Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli (c), Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant (wk), Hardik Pandya, Washington Sundar, Axar Patel, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Shardul Thakur, Yuzvendra Chahal
England
Jason Roy, Jos Buttler (wk), Dawid Malan, Jonny Bairstow, Eoin Morgan (c), Ben Stokes, Sam Curran, Jofra Archer, Chris Jordan, Adil Rashid, Mark Wood
Key Players
India
KL Rahul
Last 10 matches – 360 runs at an average of 40
Virat Kohli
Last 9 matches – 265 runs at an average of 29.44
England
Dawid Malan
Last 10 matches – 410 runs at an average of 58.57
Jos Buttler
Last 6 matches – 245 runs at an average of 61.25
