India started its 2019 WC campaign with the victory, but some of the things on which India needs work, which was seen in the match against SA. First of all, after having 5 wicket down below 100 run, still SA managed to set the target of 228, secondly, tough time was given to the Indian batting, particularly the top order, on which India is highly dependent, and last but not the least unsettle middle order.
The next match with the Australian team, on paper it looks pretty good, but against India, mainly in recent time, not as good as it is felt. As Finch is highly exposed against B Kumar’s insuring delivery, Maxwell already felt hard time against Chahal and Bumrah. WI tried to find Warner’s weakness against short delivery and got success, Stoinis and Carey are still not create such image. Only Smith, who could not allow anyone to find his weakness. In the bowling department, Counter-Nile and Cummins couldn’t find the rhythm yet, Zampa is taking the wickets but economy is pretty high, Only Starc could leave some fear in the opposite team, but that’s main issue for Indian team. As opening pair already showed that they are not comfortable against the left arm seamer, and Aus’s main strength in bowling department is left arm seamer, not only starc but also Behendorff. It’s highly chances that Aus will replace counter-nile with Behendorff, though Counter-nile was the difference in the previous match against WI and Aus could manage to win that.
Though, India won the previous match, and it is recommended to stay with the wining combination, but due to Australian strength, India should change its previous combination, and open the batting with KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma, as it is shown that Dhavan was not comfortable against left arm seamer in even the warm up matches as well, and put V Shankar in the middle order, though he has less experience, but can provide the bowling variation. Definitely it’s really tough to decide the first eleven, but India should take chance, as it is just a second match out of nine matches of the WC.
Regarding the pitch, The Oval pitch is definitely considered the batting pitch, and since WC 2015, the average chasing total is 320, but it is shown in the WC, that more than 300 couldn’t be chasable, though both the time SA couldn’t chase, but even NZ could manage to win against Ban by just 2 wickets in target of 245 only, so the recommendation is win the toss and choose to field, but batting first in not the purity of loosing the match, top pf that Kul-Cha of India has good record against Aus, not just in India, on the contrary, outside of India.
My Eleven,
India: KL Rahul, RG Sharma, V Kohli, V Shankar, MS Dhoni, K Jadhav, H Pandya, B Kumar, K Yadav, Y Chahal, J Bumrah,
Aus could come with the eleven,
Aus: D Warner, A Finch, U Khwaja, S Smith, G Maxwell, M Stoinis, A Carey, P Cummins, M Starc, A Zampa, J Benedorff
