Follow Us17. That is how many T20 Internationals team India have played since the World Cup last year, by far the most by any side in the said period. Yet Saturday’s clash at Edgbaston is set to be very, very different from any of the previous matches they’ve played in the past 8 months: it will be the first time under the captaincy of Rohit Sharma that the Men in Blue will be fielding their full-strength XI.
It speaks volumes of India’s depth that they’ve managed to win 14/17 without even fielding their best XI. In the first T20I at the Rose Bowl, they routed England without the presence of Bumrah, Kohli, Pant and Jadeja among others.
But with the T20 World Cup in Australia getting closer and closer, it will be imperative for the management to figure out the side’s best combination when everyone is fit and available. The last two games of this series will provide them with the rare opportunity to do just that. Well, sans KL Rahul, at least.
England, meanwhile, will be desperate to just get back to winning ways, having now lost four of the six T20Is they’ve played this calendar year. In particular, the Three Lions would be hoping for a markedly improved showing with the bat, having been blown away by the Indian seamers in Southampton.
Frankly, these T20Is are not games of great consequence for the hosts, but it goes without saying that the last thing newly-appointed skipper Buttler would want is seeing the ‘Jos era’ begin with a loss.
To get the ‘Jos era’ up and running, however, England, on Saturday, will have to do something that no team has managed to do in the past 8 months: beat a Rohit Sharma-led side in a limited-overs international.
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Where do India fit in Virat Kohli?
Unquestionably, all the spotlight will be on the returning Virat Kohli, who, if reports are to be believed, is no longer a sure-shot starter in the T20 side and could potentially be playing for his spot. Kohli has only played two T20Is this year and the second T20I on Saturday will also be his first since the rotten IPL 2022 season where he averaged 22.73.
Upon his return, team India face the tricky prospect of fitting the 33-year-old in the starting XI.
Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya and Dinesh Karthik — the only designated finisher — all being indispensable leaves Deepak Hooda’s No.3 as the only vacant middle-order spot. But that, one assumes, will be taken by the returning Rishabh Pant. Not the number three spot per se — Suryakumar, in all likelihood, will bat there, with Pant likely moving to No.4 to bring some much needed left-handedness — but a spot in the middle-order, certainly.
That leaves Ishan Kishan as the only other player that can make way for Kohli. Stature and seniority wise, Kohli warrants a place ahead of Kishan in the XI, but the situation is more complicated than what meets the eye.
There are two key questions here: one, does the 33-year-old fit into the side as an opener, especially given that he’ll be opening alongside a fellow right-hander in Rohit? And two, with India now keen on playing an ultra-positive brand of cricket, particularly while batting first, can Kohli adapt, and does he fit the bill? It is worth remembering that the right-hander struck at under 120 in each of his last two IPL seasons.
It is unlikely that the management will leave out a player of Kohli’s reputation from the starting XI, but one does get the sense that fitting him into the side will be out of obligation rather than will.
The Rahul Dravid-led management have a huge decision to make, come the second T20I.
A fresh chapter in T20Is beckons Ravindra Jadeja the batter
Despite having played 58 T20Is to date, the truth is that Ravindra Jadeja has hardly impacted games with the bat in the shortest format. That is largely due to how low he’s batted: 23 of Jadeja’s 29 innings in T20Is have come at No.7 or lower. But with Dinesh Karthik now becoming an integral part of the side, a fresh chapter in T20Is beckons Jadeja the batter.
Karthik being used in a peculiar way in T20s — as an out-and-out finisher that almost exclusively bats at the death — will mean a guaranteed promotion for Jadeja, who more often than not is bound to find himself batting at No.6 or higher in order to delay the entry point of the latter.
Moving up one slot might not seem like a big deal, but it will finally enable the left-hander to impact games more with the bat, maybe even on a consistent basis.
Jadeja impacting matches with the bat will be huge for India, for it will add a whole new dynamic to the line-up. The southpaw might have had an IPL 2022 to forget, but across the 2020 and 2021 seasons — and even in the tour of Australia in 2020 — he showed that he is a transformed batter in limited-overs cricket.
Needless to mention, the presence of Jadeja is also bound to embolden those above him to bat more aggressively and take more chances, for they know there is one extra batter that can be relied upon.
Misfiring Tymal Mills in the spotlight
With Jofra Archer, Chris Woakes and Mark Wood injured and Adil Rashid unavailable, the hosts have been severely handicapped on the bowling front. Amidst this crisis, what’s not been helping them is the dwindling form of Tymal Mills, who has not produced a performance of note for England since his 3/27 in Abu Dhabi against Bangladesh in the T20 World Cup.
Across his last six T20Is, the 29-year-old has picked up just 4 wickets while going at 11.37 an over.
The concern for England is that this rut is now pretty elongated, one that extends beyond just internationals. Outside the Vitality Blast — where he’s taken 15 wickets in 9 games despite conceding at 9.47 — Mills has had a nightmarish year, averaging nearly 41 while going at 11.20 per over.
The left-armer was the most underwhelming seamer across both sides in the five-match T20I series against West Indies — where he took 1 wicket in 3 games at an ER of 11.12 — and he then followed that up with an IPL to forget, a season in which he played just 5 games and conceded at an ER over 11.
He is currently evidently shot on confidence and that showed in the first T20I at the Rose Bowl, where he did not complete his full quota of overs and finished with figures of 1/35 off 3, being taken apart up-front by Suryakumar Yadav and at the death by Dinesh Karthik.
Mills deservedly broke back into the side at the T20 World Cup, but after a string of impressive performances, it’s gone all downhill for the left-armer. He is now in desperate need of bouncing back — not just for his team’s sake, but also his own.
Probable XIs
With the big guns returning for the final two games, expect Kohli, Pant, Bumrah and Jadeja to take the place of Kishan, Hooda, Arshdeep and Axar respectively.
India: Rohit Sharma ©, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant (wk), Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Dinesh Karthik, Harshal Patel, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jasprit Bumrah
It is unlikely that England will be reactionary and make changes after one loss. Expect the hosts to field an unchanged XI.
England: Jason Roy, Jos Buttler (c & wk), Dawid Malan, Moeen Ali, Liam Livingstone, Harry Brook, Sam Curran, Chris Jordan, Tymal Mills, Reece Topley, Matthew Parkinson