India will be looking to carry the momentum gained from their thrilling win against Pakistan when they take on Netherlands at the SCG in Sydney on Thursday, October 27, at 17:00 BST.
Preview
India were in no position to win the match against Pakistan after they got reduced to 31/4 while chasing 160. But Virat Kohli played a majestic knock of an unbeaten 82 from 53 deliveries to help India to a magical win. It was an inspiring knock and the scenes in Melbourne after that win were spectacular. The Indian players rallied around Kohli and lifted him on the field. Kohli also got emotional and mentioned it as the best T20I knock of his career. It wasn’t only Kohli, though, who made India’s win possible. Hardik Pandya also played a crucial knock of 40 and built a stand of 113 with Kohli. The Indian bowlers also performed well as they restricted Pakistan to a chaseable total and they will be looking to deliver an equally good performance here.
Netherlands, on the other hand, came very close to registering a memorable win against Bangladesh in their first Super 12 encounter. The bowlers did a great job to restrict the Tigers to 144 and then Colin Ackermann played a fabulous knock of 62 to get the Dutch close to the total. However, they still fell nine runs short as the other batters couldn’t provide enough support. Now this match against India is going to be a totally different challenge for them. Rohit Sharma’s men are a far superior team and they will be the favourites to win this contest by a mile.
Predicted Playing XIs
Netherlands
Max O’Dowd, Vikramjit Singh, Bas de Leede, Colin Ackermann, Tom Cooper, Scott Edwards (c & wk), Tim Pringle, Logan van Beek, Shariz Ahmad, Fred Klaassen, Paul van Meekeren
India
Rohit Sharma (c), KL Rahul, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Axar Patel, Ravichandran Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Mohammed Shami, Arshdeep Singh
Key Players
Virat Kohli: He was in a rut for the last couple of years but he has regained his form since his century against Afghanistan in the Asia Cup. Kohli also played magnificent knock of 82* in the previous encounter against Pakistan and he will be the key to India’s success in this match once again.
Bas de Leede: He hasn’t had a great time as a batter in this competition but De Leede has been delivering consistently with the ball. He is the joint highest wicket-taker in this T20 World Cup so far, with nine wickets to his name at 10.77 runs a piece.
Prediction
India are the favourites to win this contest as they are a far superior team than Netherlands and are also coming into this match on the back of an inspiring win against Pakistan.
