By Our Special Correspondent
All but out of reckoning for the summit clash, a disheveled India would like to put their house in order before facing a gutsy Afghanistan team which could prove to be a proverbial banana peel in the final Super 4 clash of the Asia Cup on Thursday.
The Indian team hasn’t performed to its full potential in the Super 4 stage and lack of resources and poor team selection can also be blamed for back-to-back demoralizing defeats against Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
What ails the current Indian team is lack of flexibility in its planning and perhaps a few fingers will be pointed at head coach Rahul Dravid.
It seems that Dravid is wary of taking a few hard calls when it comes to team selections as the team does not seem to have a Plan B in its armory.
In this backdrop, an Afghanistan team with some top quality T20 players like Rashid Khan, Mujeeb Zadran, Mohammed Nabi, Hazratullah Zazai and the exciting Rahamanullah Gurbaz can really set the cat amongst pigeons.
This is a team that can chase down a targets in the 170-odd range with its power hitters and can also restrict opposition to manageable totals with leader of the attack Rashid intimidating the opposition.
What goes against them as a team is collective inexperience of not playing the bigger cricketing nations regularly. However T20 is one format where an individual performance can decisively tilt the scales.
Skipper Rohit, however urged everyone not to be too harsh on Bhuvneshwar.
“Even experienced bowlers go for runs. Bhuvi has been playing for us for so many years and has won us so many matches in death over’s,” Rohit said in his senior seamer’s defence.
Teams (from): India: Rohit Sharma (c), KL Rahul, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Deepak Hooda, Dinesh Karthik, Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, R Ashwin, Yuzvendra Chahal, Ravi Bishnoi, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Arshdeep Singh, Deepak Chahar.
Afghanistan: Mohammad Nabi (C), Najibullah Zadran (VC), Afsar Zazai (WK), Azmatullah Omarzai, Farid Ahmad Malik, Fazal Haq Farooqi, Hashmatullah Shahidi, Hazratullah Zazai, Ibrahim Zadran, Karim Janat, Mujib ur Rahman, Najibullah Zadran, Naveen ul Haq, Noor Ahmad, Rahmanullah Gurbaz (WK), Rashid Khan and Samiullah Shinwari.(PTI)
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