 Despite losing the ODI series by 2-4, India the twenty20 world champions start as favorites to win the one of twenty20 to be played at Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai.Indian team will play with their full twenty20 squad who manage to won first twenty20 world cup earlier in South Africa. Statistics also favoring Indians for this match, they have played eight twenty20 matches and won six matches with one loss against New Zealand and one match is drawn against Scotland. However on the other hand Australia has played 11 matches and only manages to win 5 of their matches so far. Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni will be looking forward to a good start from his openers Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir, who is coming back from an injury lay-off. Yuvraj Singh is another player to watch out for, since he was one of the most destructive batsman in the twenty20 world cup hitting six sixes in an over of England pace bowler Stuart Broad. Indians have Robin Uthappa who is another dashing and hard hitting batsman to watch out for, the good times have rolled on, as he's played a couple of exciting and critical knocks in different positions in the batting order in the 50-over format. When asked if it was easy to play this floating role, Uthappa said: "It's easy if you keep an open mind. You should not think: 'I'm fit to play in one position or another.' If you have an open mind anything is possible. If you want to do it for your team you'll do it." In twenty20 squad Indians have bunch of all rounder like Yusuf Pathan, Irfan Pathan and Joginder Sharma and they can turn the table in their favor when it matters most. Indian may opt to go with two spinners for this match with two pace bowlers (Irfan and R.P Singh), Murali Karthik has taken into the team in place of injured Piyush Chawla. However, it would be wise if the team’s think-tank decides for one specialist spinner as both Sehwag and Yuvraj can bowl a bit. If the two of them can bowl a decent four overs spell between them, the Indians can think of going in with just two seamers (R P Singh and Irfan Pathan), one all-rounder (Joginder Sharma) and a spinner (Harbhajan Singh) and accommodate a specialist batsman in the middle. We may see another interesting encounter like twenty20 semi finals between these two teams. Aussie skipper Ricky Ponting already had made it very clear that the would be looking forward to avenge the World Cup semi-final loss at the hands of the Indians and they mean business in the last match of their India tour. Match will start from 7.00 PM (Indian Time which will be Day/Night Encounter) Likely Playing XI for Both teams: Indian Squad: Virendra Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, R. Sharma, Yuvraj Singh, Mahendra Singh Dhoni (C/WK), Robin Uthappa, Irfan Pathan, R.P. Singh, S. Sreesanth, Murali Karthik, Harbhajan Singh Australian Squad: Mathew Hayden, Adam Gilchrist (WK), Ricky Ponting (C), Brad Hodge, Michael Clarke, Andrew Symonds, JR Hopes, Brett Lee, Mitchell Johnson, Stuark Clark, Nathan Bracken. |
