3 player battles to watch out for in India vs Pakistan, Super Fours, Match 3 of Asia Cup 2023
India and Pakistan are set to lock horns once again, this time in the Super Fours phase of the ongoing Asia Cup 2023 at the R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo on Sunday, September 11.
The two teams met in the group phase as well, where only one innings was possible with rain playing spoilsport. While the rain threat looms large on the contest, fans will be hopeful that the weather gods show some mercy as it promises to be a riveting encounter.
The Pakistan pace attack was all over the Indian top order in the last game, before a heroic partnership between Hardik Pandya and Ishan Kishan rescued the Men in Blue to a competitive total of 266.
While getting a result wasn't possible, here are three match-ups that could certainly go a long way in determining the faith of the Super Fours clash between these two teams:
#3 Babar Azam vs Jasprit Bumrah
Pakistan captain Babar Azam is deservedly the current No.1 ODI batter in the world and his numbers tell the story, having already scored 19 hundreds in this format. He had an off-day against Bangladesh and would certainly want to get back among the runs against the arch-rivals.
While Kuldeep Yadav is a favorable match-up for India against Babar, they also have the X-factor of Jasprit Bumrah to test the star batter upfront. With rain around, the conditions could likely be conducive to pacers and that's what makes this match-up interesting. So far in ODI cricket, Babar has scored 17 runs off 26 balls from Bumrah and is yet to be dismissed.
#2 Shubman Gill vs Naseem Shah
Shubman Gill played a pretty scratchy knock of 10 (32) against Pakistan in their previous clash and was particularly troubled by the new-ball speedster Naseem Shah. The right-hander found it tough to get going and could only score a solitary run from ten deliveries of Naseem, playing and missing a lot.
The youngster came in the press conference explaining how challenging it might get as the Indians haven't played the Pakistan pacers regularly. However, with the experience that he had just more than a week ago, it will be interesting to see how Gill would approach his innings if Naseem gets the ball to talk once again.
#1 Rohit Sharma vs Shaheen Afridi
Arguably a no-brainer when it comes to the most-awaited player battle among all as Indian captain Rohit Sharma has had a pretty tough time of late against left-arm pacers. Shaheen Afridi had dismissed Rohit in the T20 World Cup a couple of years ago and there was a lot of talk about how the Men in Blue skipper would tackle the left-arm threat.
While Rohit seemed to have adjusted his technique a bit to successfully dig out a few of the full swinging deliveries from Shaheen, it is the good length delivery that got the better of him in the last game. Shaheen pulled his length back a bit and the seam movement castled Rohit Sharma's stumps.
India need their captain to score big on Sunday and Rohit will need to find a way to ensure he is still out there after Shaheen's new ball burst.