WESTBURY, NY – Pakistan won the all-important toss on a mysterious cricket pitch and opted to bowl first against their arch-rivals India in the main Twenty20 World Cup game on Sunday.
Rain delayed the draw for the Group A game by half an hour, with another interruption preventing any play before the revised start time of 11:20am EDT (3:20pm GMT). Pakistani quick Shaheen Shah Afridi bowled the first ball to India opener Rohit Sharma in cloudy weather.
Tricky pitches at New York’s newly built 34,000-capacity stadium will once again come into focus. Canada is the only team to have successfully defended 137 against Ireland in four low-scoring games on variable bounce wickets.
The ICC had to revisit the four-pitch square after the low-scoring first two games, but the pitches have given batsmen little respite so far.
A shaky Pakistan made a change on Sunday from its shock defeat against tournament co-host USA in the Super Over in Dallas, which brought in the all-rounder Imad Wasim in place of the outstanding Azam Khan. Wasim missed Pakistan’s opening game due to a side strain but was declared fit for the decisive game.
“The past is the past and we are looking forward to this match,” said Pakistan captain Babar Azam.
India stuck to the same team that defeated Ireland by eight wickets at the same venue in New York, where variable bounce saw the Irish team dismissed for 96 and India raced to 97-2 with more than seven overs remaining.
India has been based in New York since arriving in the United States. He also played a friendly against Bangladesh before beating Ireland.
“We have played a few matches here (and) tried to assess the conditions as much as possible,” said Indian captain Rohit Sharma. “Every game is important. Anything can happen, this is a very fun tournament.”
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Lineups:
Pakistan: Babar Azam (captain), Mohammad Rizwan, Usman Khan, Fakhar Zaman, Iftikhar Ahmed, Shadab Khan, Imad Wasim, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Naseem Shah, Mohammad Amir, Haris Rauf.
India: Rohit Sharma (captain), Virat Kohli, Rishabh Pant, Suryakumar Yadav, Shivam Dube, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh, Mohammed Siraj.
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