Surya’s men ready for Aussie challenge as T20 World Cup prep begins.
The leader in Suryakumar Yadav will nudge the batter in him to take centrestage and start contributing handsomely with the willow when India take on Australia in the opening T20 International in Canberra on Wednesday.
It promises to be a battle on even keel with both countries having won eight of their last 10 T20I games with a defeat each. While India had one tied game, Australia saw one game washed out.
While the captain's prolonged bad patch remains a cause of worry, the Indian T20 team has been the best of three national outfits, almost operating on autopilot with the new players taking on their roles like fish to water.
Since being appointed captain, Suryakumar's record has been phenomenal in terms of results, with 23 wins in 29 games so far, adhering to the new template of fearless cricket where every batter goes all guns blazing from ball one.
The aggression at all costs and Surya's own leadership skills have worked really well with an all-win bilateral series record and the Asia Cup triumph, albeit, against some second rung continental teams, including Pakistan, who are a few light years behind India in terms of skill, quality and execution.
The Australia series marks the beginning of India's real preparation going into the T20 World Cup early next year with 15 games to get into the groove.
But one can say that the result of this series will not have a major impact as the next 10 games against South Africa and New Zealand will be on familiar conditions, something similar to what they are likely to get in T20 World Cup.
For someone like Abhishek Sharma, who became the toast of the nation in Asia Cup, tackling the extra bounce on Australian pitches will be a new challenge and hence skipper's contribution becomes all the more important.
It will not only be a new set of question for someone like Abhishek but also old set of queries for the Indian skipper, whose critics always point out that he hasn't consistently scored against big teams in past few years.
In terms of bowling attack, Jasprit Bumrah's presence and Varun Chakravarthy's guile will be the important factors if Indian batters can put up a decent score.
The 12 overs from Varun, Kuldeep Yadav and Axar Patel will be very important alongside Bumrah and Arshdeep's opening spells against Travis Head and the dangerous Mitchell Marsh.
All eyes will also be on Mitchell Owen, Australia's new T20 star who played a game for Punjab Kings last year. Owen was terrific against India in a recent ODI in Adelaide but possibility of facing 12 overs of slow bowling will definitely test his hitting skills.
Teams:
India: Suryakumar Yadav (C), Abhishek Sharma, Shubman Gill (VC), Tilak Varma, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Jitesh Sharma (WK), Varun Chakaravarthy, Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav, Harshit Rana, Sanju Samson (WK), Rinku Singh, Washington Sundar.
Australia: Mitchell Marsh (c), Sean Abbott (games 1-3), Xavier Bartlett, Mahli Beardman (games 3-5), Tim David, Ben Dwarshuis (games 4-5), Nathan Ellis, Josh Hazlewood (games 1-2), Glenn Maxwell (games 3-5), Travis Head, Josh Inglis, Matthew Kuhnemann, Mitchell Owen, Josh Philippe, Tanveer Sangha, Matthew Short, Marcus Stoinis.
Match Starts: 1:45 pm.