Surprisingly, Indians will be in a spot of bother when they play Zimbabwe in the second T20I on Monday at Harare. Indian have faced the consequences of taking Zimbabweans lightly after the ODI white-wash, losing the first T20I by 2 runs.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni will look to tighten things up when India takes the field on Monday evening. He would not mind bringing a few changes in the team, if not many.
One of the changes may include bringing Manish Pandey up in the batting order. He has been wasting his talent at number 4. He’s been batting at the same position for quite a while now and has not got any chance to show his batting skills. On Monday, he played a good hand with the bat with his 48 off 25 balls. If he was batting at number 1 or 2, a decent performance could have given India just the right kind of start.
Dhoni should consider dropping KL Rahul from the playing XI and include Karun Nair in the middle order with Manish Pandey at the top alongside Mandeep Singh.
Rishi Dhawan has not done much to prove his worth in the side. He was not impressive either in Australia or in the IPL. Rishi did not get enough balls to bat in the first T20I but even his bowling failed to impress in the last match. His right-arm medium pace could not trouble any of the Zimbabwean batters. He gave away 42 runs in 4 overs on Saturday. Jaydev Undakat too looked far from his best as he gave 43 runs in his spell of 4 overs. India cannot bear such poor performances from two of their opening bowlers. Dhoni would like to bring Barinder Sran in the team in order to pick some early wickets. Only time will tell if Dhoni goes on to bring these changes or sticks with the same XI.
Zimbabwe will look to seal the series with another win on Monday. An injury to Vusi Sibanda is worrisome and chances are he might not take the field on Monday. If Zimbabwe manages to win the series, this will be their first T20I series win. Also, a series win now will give their fans some sort of respite and a message to the teams around the world that they should not be sending second-string sides to Zimbabwe.
Playing XI probables:
Zimbabwe
1 Hamilton Masakadza, 2 Chamu Chibhabha, 3 Richmond Mutumbami/Timycen Maruma/Peter Moor, 4 Sikandar Raza, 5 Malcolm Waller (wk), 6 Elton Chigumbura, 7 Tinotenda Mutombodzi, 8 Graeme Cremer (capt), 9 Neville Madziva, 10 Taurai Muzarabani, 11 Donald Tiripano
India
Manish Pandey, Mandeep Singh, Ambati Rayudu, Karun Nair, Kedar Jadhav, Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt & wk), Axar Patel, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jaydev Unadakat, Barinder Sram, Jasprit Bumrah
