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India look to tick the top-order box against Afghanistan
Rohit, Kishan and Iyer fell without scoring against the Aussies in Chennai and they would dearly love to get a few runs under their belt.
Pre-match press conferences are usually littered with cliches of the following variety.
“We are focusing on one game at a time.”
“We are not looking too far ahead.”
“Every game is important.”
For India though, it’s really about driving home these banal phrases ahead of their clash against Afghanistan at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Wednesday. Because as another cliche goes, India can’t afford to take it lightly against a team that's ever improving and made it to this World Cup by finishing in the top eight of the ODI Super League rather than via the qualifiers. Their two most recent meetings are useful reminders. In the 2019 World Cup, Afghanistan lost by just 11 runs after restricting India to 224/8. In 2018, the two teams played out a tie in the Asia Cup.
Particularly after India’s victory against Australia where they hit the right notes in most facets, it is not always easy to hit top gear given the short turnaround time. But that’s the nature of the World Cup, and India will want to have two wins on the board before the intensity of the campaign gets ramped up several notches against Pakistan in Ahmedabad on Saturday.
The box they will want to primarily tick against Afghanistan is the performance of the top order. Rohit Sharma, Ishan Kishan and Shreyas Iyer fell without scoring against the Aussies in Chennai, placing the onus on Virat Kohli and KL Rahul to stitch together a solid partnership on the way to a target of 200. Which they did with aplomb.
Opener Shubman Gill is out of the reckoning, and he is unlikely to play against Pakistan as well given that he was hospitalised in Chennai. “He is recovering well. He was hospitalised, yes, but that was more as a precaution. He is back in the hotel; he is recovering well. So, being monitored by the medical team and whatever update we get, we are hoping that he will recover pretty soon. He is looking good actually,” India batting coach Vikram Rathour said at the pre-match media interaction on Tuesday.
In his absence, Kishan will hope to come good at the top of the order alongside Sharma, which will allow Kohli and the rest the luxury of leveraging a strong foundation. Kishan did have a hit in the nets at Kotla, as did Sharma, Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja and Shardul Thakur in an optional session. A brief moment of worry from the training session was when Sharma got hit above his left knee against a net bowler. The India skipper reacted by moving gingerly for a couple of minutes, but the team will hope it’s nothing serious given that he went on to face a few more deliveries.
Back to Kishan, who didn’t look the most fluent at the nets. It’s not ideal that he has been shuffled up and down the order in recent games, but the pitch, going by the first game between South Africa and Sri Lanka at this venue, should be conducive to run scoring.
While he’s a natural fit as an opening batter in white-ball cricket, his preparations ahead of the World Cup must have been geared towards playing in the middle order. The Indian team management doesn’t see it as a hurdle for Kishan though.
“Kishan has opened in the past. So, no specific discussion on that. That was the reason he has been in the team. We knew that he can bat at the top of the order or in the middle order. So, he has done that before. Just hoping that he comes good tomorrow,” Rathour said.
This game for India is sandwiched between two high-profile clashes against Australia and Pakistan, but there could be some drama here too. Particularly if Afghanistan pacer Naveen-ul-Haq hits his stride against Kohli. Remember their run-in during this year’s IPL?
Afghanistan captain Hashmatullah Shahidi chose to play down the individual battle. “What happened in the ground, that aggression comes to every player, it's not about India and Afghanistan. So, it can come to everyone. So, this happened and still if you see a lot of our players, we have idols from the Indian team like Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid. So, there’s not any concern about that,” Shahidi said.
Afghanistan, as Shahidi acknowledged, have benefitted from their cricketing ties with India. Venues in Dehradun, Lucknow and Greater Noida have served as Afghanistan’s home in the past while more players are being picked by IPL franchises in the auction each year. Ace spinner Rashid Khan is a known face all across India. Away from the game, there’s also a sizeable community of Afghan migrants in the national capital, taking advantage of education and work opportunities here.
None of this will take away the feistiness of the Afghan players. While they started their World Cup with a dispiriting defeat to Bangladesh, Shahidi is driven by the knowledge that a win against India will create headlines. “The loss against Bangladesh doesn’t mean we are not a good team. We still have the belief and our statement is the same,” he said. “We are here to make this World Cup historic for our country and to show to the world. In events like the World Cup, beating any team is better than a series win. Our aim as a team is to achieve a lot in this World Cup because we still have eight games.”
