Bangladesh won the toss and elected to field first in their penultimate Group 2 Super 12 match of ICC T20 World Cup at Adelaide Oval in Adelaide on Wednesday (Nov 02).
Both the teams are currently in a similar position-- having won two out of their three matches in the tournament so far -- to qualify for the semi-finals but India are ahead of Bangladesh in terms of net run rate.
South Africa are leading the ladder with five points from three games while Zimbabwe and Pakistan still have some chances to finish in the top two in this group. Netherlands have already been knocked out of the race for the last four.
Although Bangladesh are in a very good position to progress to the semi-finals for the first time in a T20 World Cup, they remain realistic ahead of the crucial India encounter.
The Tigers have already achieved their best T20 World Cup results from the ongoing tournament as they have beaten both Netherlands and Zimbabwe in the main stage but in order to reach the last four, they still require two more wins from their last two matches against India and Pakistan.
India have recently suffered a five-wicket defeat against South Africa to whom the Tigers conceded a 104-run bashing in their second match.
However, the stats and strength of both sides suggest that India will be the clear favourites against Bangladesh in this important tie of the group and it was also admitted by Bangladesh skipper Shakib Al Hasan during the pre-match press conference.
Bangladesh have played 11 T20Is so far against India from where they could win only one game and lost the remaining ones.
While India have a lot of experience and depth in their side, this Bangladesh side is a much younger one than the other teams in this tournament and it will not be wise to make any comparison between the teams.
Bangladesh: 1 Najmul Hossain Shanto, 2 Litton Das, 4 Shakib Al Hasan, 4 Afif Hossain, 5 Nurul Hasan (wk), 6 Mosaddek Hossain, 7 Yasir Ali, 8 Taskin Ahmed, 9 Mustafizur Rahman, 10 Hasan Mahmud, 11 Shoriful Islam
India: 1 KL Rahul, 2 Rohit Sharma (capt), 3 Virat Kohli, 4 Suryakumar Yadav, 5 Hardik Pandya, 6 Axar Patel, 7 Dinesh Karthik (wk), 8 R Ashwin, 9 Mohammed Shami, 10 Bhuvneshwar Kumar, 11 Arshdeep Singh
BDST:1402 HRS, NOV 02, 2022
MN
