India vs Australia 2023 weather update: Rajkot weather report for September 27 for IND vs AUS 3rd ODI
Team India will look to inflict a series whitewash when they square off against Australia in the third ODI at the Saurashtra Cricket Association Stadium on Wednesday. The Men in Blue are currently 2-0 up in the three-match rubber.
The hosts produced a scintillating performance in the last game in Indore. Batting first, they racked up 399 runs, riding on centuries from Shreyas Iyer and Shubman Gill. KL Rahul and Suryakumar Yadav then smashed half-centuries to cap off a brilliant batting performance.
Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja produced spectacular spells to back the good work done by the batters. Australia were 140/8 at one stage before Sean Abbott's breathtaking half-century helped them cross the 200-run mark. The Aussies eventually fell 99 runs short via the DLS method to concede the three-match series.
Pat Cummins and company will hope to bounce back to get some momentum back before the World Cup. India, on the other hand, will look to whitewash the five-time world champions for the first time in history.
Meanwhile, all eyes will be on the weather as both teams will hope for a full 100 overs of action. Much to the delight of players and fans, the weather forecast looks bright, with a slim chance of precipitation.
According to Accuweather, there is only a six to seven percent chance of rain throughout the game in Rajkot on Wednesday.
The temperature will hover around 32 degrees Celsius, with 50 percent cloud cover. The actual feeling would be three to four degrees higher than the original temperature due to excessive humidity.
"It doesn't really matter what kind of ranking you go within" - Indian skipper Rohit Sharma plays down talks about ranking
Team India became the second team in history to be the top side in the ICC Ranking across all formats after beating Australia by five wickets in the first ODI.
However, skipper Rohit Sharma didn't seem too perturbed with the rankings. He stressed the importance of playing good cricket on that given day.
"It doesn't really matter what kind of ranking you go within or what sort of performances you've had in the past," Rohit said on the eve of the third ODI.
"Yes, it's a good positive thing to take forward, but you know that the sport these days are played on present. So we got to play very good cricket on the present day, not worry about what has happened in the past, what in terms of the ranking, where we stand and stuff like that," he continued.
"You got to play good cricket and you got to stay in the present. For us, you know, that is very critical. Everybody staying in the present, doing their job, putting the hand up when the team needs them to do it and things like that," Rohit added.
Can India continue their winning run against Australia? Let us know in the comment section.