New Delhi. The Indian cricket team will play its second Super-8 match against Zimbabwe in the T20 World Cup today. It is very important for Team India to win this match to reach the knockout. After winning all four matches of the group stage, India (-3.800 net run rate) had to face a crushing defeat by 76 runs at the hands of South Africa in its first match of Super-8. This crushing defeat has pushed India to the third position in the points table of Group-1. West Indies (+5.350 net run rate) and South Africa (+3.800 net run rate) are at the first and second positions respectively after winning their first matches. At the same time, Zimbabwe (-5.350 net run rate) is at the bottom after losing its first match.
‘Do or die’ match for India
To reach the knockout, India would like to win its last two matches of Super-8 by big margins and South Africa would like to win its next two matches. If we look at the wicket of MA Chidambaram Stadium, it has proved to be the best batting wicket in this tournament in terms of both average and strike rate. It has been very difficult for the fast bowlers to take wickets and stop runs here.
india vs zimbabwe chennai pitch report
For whom will the pitch be helpful?
In the match between India and Zimbabwe on Thursday (26 February), the same black soil pitch will be used on which New Zealand had achieved the target of 183 runs against Afghanistan in just 17.5 overs. In such a situation, Indian batsmen will try to put a big score on the board by batting aggressively.
The weather is expected to be clear during this match. The temperature will be around 20 degrees Celsius. A total of 13 T20 matches have been played between India and Zimbabwe so far, in which India won 10 matches, while Zimbabwe won 3 matches. One of these matches was played in the World Cup, which Team India won by 71 runs. Zimbabwe has never played any T20 match against India in India.
Indian team: Ishan Kishan (wicketkeeper), Abhishek Sharma, Tilak Verma, Suryakumar Yadav (captain), Washington Sundar, Shivam Dubey, Hardik Pandya, Rinku Singh, Arshdeep Singh, Varun Chakraborty, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Siraj, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Sanju Samson.
Zimbabwe team: Tadivanashe Marumani (wk), Brian Bennett, Dion Myers, Ryan Burl, Alexander Raza (captain), Tony Munyonga, Tshinga Musekiwa, Brad Evans, Graeme Cremer, Blessing Muzarabani, Richard Ngarwa, Ben Curran, Clive Madande, Tinotenda Maphosa, Wellington Masakadza.