Abu Dhabi [UAE], September 19 : India T20I captain Suryakumar Yadav won the toss and opted to bat against Oman in the final group stage fixture at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi at the ongoing Asia Cup on Friday. Interestingly, both skippers forgot the changes that they made in their playing XI.
While featuring in Group A, India has hardly broken a sweat while cruising to victories over the UAE and arch-rival Pakistan en route to the Super Four stage.
The match is a dead rubber, considering India will stay at the top irrespective of the result that unfolds before the night ends. Remarkably, this will be the first time India and Oman are playing against each other.
Kuldeep Yadav has been unplayable, bagging Player of the Match awards in both fixtures, while Varun Chakravarthy remains a mystery for many who struggle to pick him up. Meanwhile, Oman was blown away by Pakistan but put up more fight against the UAE. Oman would hope to end the campaign by pulling off an upset.
India made two changes for the contest, with Arshdeep Singh and Harshit Rana returning to the playing XI, replacing Chakravarthy and pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah. Suryakumar remembered Harshit's return but had a hard time figuring out Arshdeep's inclusion.
"We are looking to bat first. We have not batted first in this competition, and we want to know our depth. Having game time is important going into the Super 4s. We want to continue the good habits we are doing in the first two games, and want to continue to do that. It is looking nice and our openers will assess it further. We have two changes - Harshit comes in, one more guy comes in, I have become like Rohit (laughs)," Suryakumar said during the time of the toss.
Oman skipper Jatinder Singh went through the same situation and said during the time of the toss, "I would have batted first. It is a great experience to take from here. Our team is young and lacks exposure, but this gives them a good chance to come here and test themselves. It is a great opportunity to share the field with India and get a look at their mindset. We have two changes."
India (Playing XI): Abhishek Sharma, Shubman Gill, Sanju Samson (wk), Suryakumar Yadav (c), Tilak Varma, Shivam Dube, Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Harshit Rana, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav
Oman (Playing XI): Aamir Kaleem, Jatinder Singh (c), Hammad Mirza, Vinayak Shukla (w), Shah Faisal, Zikria Islam, Aryan Bisht, Mohammad Nadeem, Shakeel Ahmed, Samay Shrivastava, Jiten Ramanandi.