At 7 pm tonight, as the Prime Minister of India addresses a 50,000 strong crowd in a Houston football stadium, the Indian cricket team takes on South Africa in Bangalore.
Which is why it is going to be interesting when cricket and politics, Prime Minister Modi and Captain Virat Kohli, India’s two biggest obsessions, compete for eyeballs of a 1 billion strong Sunday evening audience.
We are here to talk about the cricket though, and to be fair, the cricket would have been more interested had the South African team been a little stronger. The current South African side is not even a patch on the last one which visited India, which had the likes of AB de Villiers, Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel and Hashim Amla.
Yes, there is still Quinton de Kock, and Kagiso Rabada, but how much can just two players do? As we found in the last match, despite a brilliant batting performance by de Kock, the moment he was out, the contest was as good as over.
Similarly, having a bowling attack with just one real threat in Kagiso Rabada will not win you many matches, especially against a side like India. All the Indian batsmen have to do is play out the 4 overs of Kagiso without suffering much damage and the rest of the bowling attack is there for the taking.
Which is why there really isn’t as much of an interest in an India vs. South Africa match as there used to be in the past. One hopes, really hopes, that the South African youngsters play out of their skin tonight and somehow get a result.
They need to win really badly just to get back at least some semblance of respectability, to rejuvenate their supporters and to show that they still got it in them as a cricketing nation.
But won’t be easy against this very professional Indian outfit. Sure, questions remain as to who will play at no.4 for India. Rishabh Pant has failed to impress so far and Shreyas Iyer is still an untested and unproven entity.
Apart from that India have a very solid team where everyone is confident about their role in it. This is a team with at least 3 genuine all-rounders – Hardik Pandya and his brother Krunal, and Ravindra Jadeja. When did that last happen?
The batting line-up looks improbably strong. The bowling attack looks very good too, even with three young and inexperienced fast bowlers playing. Navdeep Saini is very impressive- tall, strong and fast, and he may well be the future star of Indian cricket. It’s just great to have him turn out in national colors.
The Teams
India: 1 Rohit Sharma, 2 Shikhar Dhawan, 3 Virat Kohli (capt), 4 Shreyas Iyer, 5 Rishabh Pant (wk), 6 Hardik Pandya, 7 Krunal Pandya/Rahul Chahar, 8 Ravindra Jadeja, 9 Washington Sundar, 10 Deepak Chahar, 11 Navdeep Saini
South Africa: 1 Quinton de Kock (capt & wk), 2 Reeza Hendricks, 3 Rassie van der Dussen, 4 Temba Bavuma, 5 David Miller, 6 Andile Phehlukwayo, 7 Dwaine Pretorius, 8 Bjorn Fortuin, 9 Kagiso Rabada, 10 Junior Dala, 11 Tabraiz Shamsi
Match Conditions
There is a strong possibility of rain in Bangalore, which could mean the match could get curtailed or even washed out. Hope not, but that is how it is! The pitch itself is a typical Chinnaswamy Stadium track – ideal for batsmen, plenty of runs in it. 200+ is a par score here.
Prediction: India to win, easily.
