The ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 is less than 10 days away and all teams participating in the mega event are gearing up to do their best to clinch the highest team award in cricket.
India, who are the hosts of the mega event, are looking forward to making their home crowd proud by winning the World Cup for the third time in their history, after their last win in 2011.
But there is one problem for the Indian batters which has been going on for a long time. According to a report by Indian media, the Blues’ openers are finding it difficult to play left-arm pacers.
India have a history of struggling against the left-armers. Starting from Pakistan’s Mohammad Amir’s spell in the T20 World Cup 2016 and then in the ICC Champions Trophy 2017 final at The Oval where he got the wickets of Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan and Virat Kohli in the starting overs and helped his side get over their arch-rivals.
New Zealand’s Trent Boult, another left-armer, troubled Indian batters in the semi-final of the World Cup 2019 and removed Kohli and Ravindra Jadeja, who was well-set on the pitch.
Shaheen Afridi, Mitchell Starc, Reece Topley, and Shoriful Islam are among those bowlers who have troubled the Blues in the past. These bowlers have made Indian batters’ lives difficult with their in-swing and yorkers.
Afridi bowled one of the most memorable spells in the T20 World Cup 2021 against India and according to the report, that spell is still remembered by the team.
England’s Sam Curran and South Africa’s Marco Jensen will be another two bowlers who can create problems for Indian batters, the report added.
India squad for ICC World Cup 2023
Rohit Sharma (c), Hardik Pandya (vc), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Shami, Axar Patel, Ishan Kishan, Suryakumar Yadav.
Schedule of India's warm-up matches
September 30 - vs England in Guwahati
October 3 - vs Netherland in Thiruvananthapuram
Schedule of India’s main round matches (all day-night)
October 8 - vs Australia in Chennai
October 11 - vs Afghanistan in Delhi
October 14 - vs Pakistan in Ahmedabad
October 19 - vs Bangladesh in Pune
October 22 - vs New Zealand in Dharamsala
October 29 – vs England in Lucknow
November 2 - vs Sri Lanka in Mumbai
November 5 - vs South Africa Kolkata
November 12 - vs Netherlands in Bengaluru
The day matches which will start at 10:00am Pakistan Standard Time (PST) while all other matches will be day-night fixtures starting at 01:30pm (PST).
If India qualify for the semi-finals, they will play in Mumbai unless playing against Pakistan, in which case they will play in Kolkata.
