Batting legend Sunil Gavaskar has backed skipper Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli as the opening pair for India’s opening T20 World Cup clash against Ireland today (4.30pm SA time start).
Gavaskar named his playing XI for India’s opening encounter in the T20 showpiece at Nassau County International Cricket Stadium in New York.
Interestingly, the veteran batter dropped pacer Arshdeep Singh from his final line-up, and backed all-rounder Shivam Dube to strengthen the batting department.
“I don’t really like selecting teams because you can never satisfy everybody – there will always be somebody’s favourite player who’s not being picked,” Gavaskar said.
“But here is my effort to try and pick the 11 for the game against Ireland. Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli to open the batting, along with Yashasvi Jaiswal at three, Suryakumar Yadav at four, Rishabh Pant at five and at number six, I would have Hardik Pandya.”
The former India captain picked Kuldeep Yadav as the sole spinner, along with all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja.
“Number seven would be Ravindra Jadeja, number eight mean not necessarily in that batting order Shivam Dube, number nine Kuldeep Yadav, number 10 Jasprit Bumrah and number 11 will be MD Siraj,” he added.
In the recently concluded IPL, Kohli finished as the highest run-getter while opening the batting for Royal Challengers Bengaluru.
He slammed 741 runs, including a century and five fifties. Keeping his recent form in mind, many have voiced his elevation at the top in the T20 World Cup.
Meanwhile, Ireland head coach Heinrich Malan said his team has the belief that it can get the better of a star-studded Indian team.
“When you look at T20 cricket, you need maybe one or two players to have a special time out and you can take down any team in the world down. India are obviously coming fresh off the IPL and I see they’ve rested a couple of guys in their warm-up stuff,” Malan said to the BBC.
“(But) T20 cricket has shown up over a fair period of time that if you play a certain way and you have the right intent and players come to the party on the day, that all teams that are going to compete at this competition are equally matched.”
Ireland enter the tournament after beating Pakistan in the opening match of their T20I series in Dublin, though they couldn’t win the next two games.
Ireland, though, won a tri-series in the Netherlands featuring the Dutch and Scotland.
Malan said skipper Paul Stirling is the ideal person to take Ireland forward in their journey as a white-ball side.
“The experience, the calmness that Stirlo brings from being on the road so much over the last five years, and his ability to keep things really simple and have a real consistency in the way that he communicates (is his great attribute). He is very precise.”
With Indian supporters set to come to the stadium in large numbers, Malan said he is hopeful of the Irish diaspora in the USA to throng the venue and cheer for Stirling and Co. “We need everyone there, to be honest. It doesn’t matter where you play India.
“We’ve played them at home over the last couple of years and they get people behind them. It will be nice to get some Irish supporters out there, and I’m sure we will.
“Hopefully, we can play some good cricket over the week that we’re there and catch up with them for a beer afterwards,” he concluded. | IANS