India chose to bowl vs New Zealand
Shreyas Iyer won his fourth toss of the tour as
India chose bowl in Auckland. They made two changes to the side that went 3-0 earlier this week with Ishan Kishan back in for Vaibhav Sooryavanshi and Mayank Yadav taking Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s spot. That means the opening stand that put on the highest powerplay in T20I history (118) has been broken up after one game.
Iyer did not seem particularly interested in making changes for the sake of it or for giving the bench players some game time. He wanted his first-choice XI in search of a 5-0 sweep. “We have decided we are not going to leave no stone unturned. We have won the series but I still feel the job is half done. It’s important to be ruthless.”
New Zealand made one change with one seam-bowling allrounder replacing another – Nathan Smith for Kyle Jamiseon. Once again they’re going to have to set a total in a format that is chase-friendly and at a ground that is even more so. New Zealand made their highest ever T20I total in Auckland – 243 – and went on to lose that game.
“Fresh day, new ground, new pitch,”
Mitchell Santner said hoping for a change in fortune. He added that his batting group is doing a great job and as a bowling group, try to find ways to get wickets and if you can’t, get out of the over. He admitted their fielding hasn’t been great.
India: 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Sanju Samson, 3 Ishan Kishan (wk), 4 Shreyas Iyer (capt), 5 Tilak Varma, 6 Nitish Kumar Reddy, 7 Naman Dhir, 8 Axar Patel, 9 Arshdeep Singh, 10 Mayank Yadav, 11 Prince Yadav
New Zealand: 1 Finn Allen, 2 Tim Seifert (wk), 3 Daryl Mitchell, 4 Glenn Phillips, 5 Bevon Jacobs, 6 Michael Bracewell, 7 Mitchell Santner (capt), 8 Nathan Smith, 9 Adam Milne, 10 Jacob Duffy, 11 Matt Fisher
Source: www.cricinfo.com
