Axar or Sundar Who will India select for 1st T20I against Sri Lanka?
India’s lengthy home season will officially begin on Tuesday with the first T20I match against Sri Lanka. There will be as many ODIs as T20Is after the three T20Is. The opening T20I is set to take place at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. Hardik Pandya has been handed the responsibility of serving as captain, with Suryakumar Yadav serving as vice-captain, in place of senior players like Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, and KL Rahul. Following the T20 World Cup in November, India’s most recent T20I series was a three-match series against New Zealand.
Pandya led India to a 1-0 victory over New Zealand in the series. The first T20I called off without a ball being bowled due to bad weather. India prevailed by 65 runs in the second T20I thanks to Suryakumar Yadav’s unbeaten 111 runs from 51 balls. With Suryakumar’s contribution, India reached 191 for 6 in 20 overs. Tim Southee secured three wickets for the hosts in the meanwhile.
Despite Kane Williamson’s innings of 61 runs off 52 balls, the host team bowled out for 126 in 18.5 overs while attempting to chase a target of 192 runs. Among India’s bowlers, Deepak Hooda claimed four wickets. Rain again played a part in the third T20I, which India won 1-0. In their chase, India tied the DLS score.
Ishan Kishan and Shubman Gill are most likely to open the innings in the opening T20I against Sri Lanka, with the former also serving as the wicketkeeper. The spotlight will be on Kishan, who recently scored two hundreds in one-day internationals and a century in a Ranji Trophy encounter. Sanju Samson, Deepak Hooda, Hardik Pandya, and Suryakumar Yadav are anticipated to make up the middle order.
Washington Sundar or Axar Patel?
Expected spinners include Washington Sundar and Yuzvendra Chahal, with Harshal Patel, Arshdeep Singh, and Umran Malik making up the pace battery.
Although it would be rather injustice to leave Axar Patel off of the playing lineup. Given his home record, the team management is probably going to stick with him given Washington Sundar’s recent form.
But, the thing to keep in mind that Sundar performed brilliantly in the ODI series in the recently concluded Bangladesh tour, and now we have T20I series against Sri Lanka, no doubt he is a decent batter, but Axar Patel is a much better batter while playing aggressive shots. It will be interesting to see what the new skipper think about this combination.
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India’s predicted XI for first T20I vs Sri Lanka:
Batters: Shubman Gill, Suryakumar Yadav, Sanju Samson
Wicket keeper: Ishan Kishan (wk)
All-rounders: Hardik Pandya (c), Deepak Hooda, Washington Sundar
Bowlers: Yuzvendra Chahal, Harshal Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Umran Malik
