A battle of contrasts on the cards as India face Afghanistan

Virat Kohli and Co. just cannot ask for more from here! Three victories in four games have placed them comfortably fourth on the log, and having played most of the tough teams (South Africa, Australia and Pakistan), it seems to be a rather easy route from here on.

Next up for India is a test against a team which is yet to register a point at the World Cup - Afghanistan. It’s a game of complete contrasts given that the Men in Blue are yet to lose while the Afghans are yet to win. The talking point, however, will be how Kohli decides to line his team given the recent injury-hit circumstances the team is enduring.

Opener Shikhar Dhawan is already ruled out of the tournament, while seamer Bhuvneshwar Kumar is nursing his hamstring injury. Next in the list is Vijay Shankar, who made his World Cup debut in India’s convincing win over Pakistan last Sunday in Manchester. The all-rounder picked up a knock on his toe while facing Jasprit Bumrah in the nets on Wednesday. The injury though is not as serious as it seems.

In turn, the team might look up to Mohammed Shami to replace Bhuvneshwar, while the likes of Dinesh Karthik, Rishabh Pant or Ravindra Jadeja are also in contention. Thus, it will be interesting to see who comes in to bat at No. 4 for India.

Afghanistan, on the other hand, have had problems of their own. Unlike their opponents, their opening order doesn’t ooze the required confidence. The fact that their top three batsmen have registered merely 290 runs in the World Cup so far (lowest amongst all teams) is a perfect testament to it.

Afghanistan’s top-three have contributed just 34% to their total runs and has as many as four ducks in the tournament. All the other nine teams’ top order have combined to produced just five thus far.

Meanwhile, as far as the weather is concerned, it is expected to be an all-clear, sun-out sky.

Squads:

India: Virat Kohli (C), Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Vijay Shankar, Hardik Pandya, Mahendra Singh Dhoni (Wk), Kedar Jadhav, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Ravindra Jadeja, Rishabh Pant, Dinesh Karthik, Bhuvneshwar Kumar.

Afghanistan: Gulbadin Naib (C), Aftab Alam, Hazratullah Zazai, Asghar Afghan, Rashid Khan, Mohammed Nabi, Mujeeb ur Rahman, Dawlat Zadran, Najibullah Zadran, Hamid Hassan, Hashmatullah Shahidi, Samiullah Shinwari, Rahmat Shah, Noor Ali Zadran, Ikram Alikhil (Wk).

Feature image courtesy: AFP / Saeed Khan