Currently nursing a knee injury, India pacer Mohammed Shami has named his playing XI for the T20 World Cup opener against Ireland at the Nassau County International Stadium in New York on Friday. Speaking on his YouTube channel, Shami, who has been out of action since the ODI World Cup last year, has backed India captain Rohit Sharma to open the innings with star batter Virat Kohli, with the star pacer leaving young opening batter Yashasvi Jaiswal out of the mix. (India vs Ireland – LIVE Updates)
As far as the team combination is concerned, Shami picked two pacers — Jasprit Bumrah and Arshdeep Singh — and as many spinners — Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal — with Ravindra Jadeja and Hardik Pandya as the fifth and sixth bowling options.
Shami also included both wicketkeepers Rishabh Pant and Sanju Samson in the playing XI, with the former to don the gloves.
“I would personally go for the left arm-right arm combination in the pace department with Arshdeep Singh partnering Jasprit Bumrah. Kuldeep, Chahal and Jadeja will be the spinners, while Hardik will be the sixth bowler,” said Shami.
Mohammed Shami’s India Playing XI vs Ireland:
Rohit Sharma (C), Virat Kohli, Rishabh Pant (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Sanju Samson, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh and Yuzvendra Chahal.
Meanwhile, dark clouds were visible in the Nassau County region. With the England-Scotland game already washed out due to rain yesterday in Barbados, fans will be hoping that the rain gods stay away from Team India’s highly-anticipated campaign opener.
On playing in almost alien conditions in the USA, Rohit said that conditions are unknown to all the teams and the team will be focusing on what it needs to do rather than their opponent.
“The conditions are quite unknown for a lot of teams. That is the same for all. You just have to play good cricket. We are not going to look into the opposition that we are playing. The important thing for us is what we are going to do with the bat, ball and field. You do look into their strengths, weakness and team composition, but that is it,” said Rohit.
(With ANI Inputs)
While Rohit Sharma is most likely to open against Ireland, the management is yet to finalise his partner for the game.