IND vs ENG, T20 World Cup Semi-Final Preview: Men in Blue seek revenge for Adelaide 2022

India avenged one heartbreak when they defeated Australia in their final Super 8 clash on Monday. They now set their sights on another when they face England in the second semi-final at the Guyana on Thursday.

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While the heartbreak at the hands of the Pat Cummins-led Australian team was more recent — 19 November last year to be more specific — the Rohit Sharma-led Indian team will not have forgotten the humiliating 10-wicket thrashing at the hands of the Jos Buttler-led English team when they had met in the semi-finals of the 2022 T20 World Cup in Adelaide.

Read | India’s heartbreaks in ICC events since winning 2013 Champions Trophy

The two teams will be led by those very captains at the Providence Stadium in Georgetown less than 24 hours from now and while the Indians will be seeking revenge, the Englishmen will be drawing inspiration from that game and try and pull off an encore.

That is if we have a match in the first place, even a curtailed one. With Thursday’s weather forecast for Georgetown not looking very promising, we might not have a game at all and both sets of players might spend the day cracking jokes in their respective dressing room among other things.

If that indeed is the case, then the Men in Blue advance to the final on the basis of having finished at the top spot in their Super 8 group. The India-England semi-final for some reason does not have a ‘Reserve Day’ in place while the other semi-final, in which South Africa defeated Afghanistan in Tarouba, had one. In which case England’s title defence will end with a washout, something they had feared in their final Group B match against Namibia.

However, if we do get some cricketing action on Thursday, the second semi-final isn’t likely to be anything similar to the events at the Adelaide Oval two years ago. India have managed to bring about some much-needed change in their approach to the shortest format and have been the most dominant team so far in this tournament, while England have looked vulnerable in patches.

If anything, fans might be in for a cracker of a contest. Maybe not as dramatic as the Afghanistan-Bangladesh match at St Vincent but one where both teams will fight tooth-and-nail till the very end.

Spotlight on Kohli and Jadeja’s form

Skipper Rohit had roared back to form in majestic fashion against Australia on Monday with a knock of 92 off just 41 balls, smashing his way to his second half-century of the tournament in just 19 deliveries and setting the tone for the rest of the batting department as they ended up posting their first 200-plus total of their campaign.

Rohit was forced to step up after yet another batting failure for Virat Kohli, whose form appeared to gradually pick up in the Super 8s after he was dismissed for single-digit scores in the group stage, only to get dismissed for his second duck of the tournament off Josh Hazlewood’s bowling.

The batting superstar has collected just 66 runs in this year’s T20 World Cup at an average of 11, and is under immense pressure heading into the semi-final. Not just because of the spectacular fall in his form right after winning the Orange Cap in the IPL, but because of the fact that he has so far failed to justify the decision of the selectors and the team management to bring him back into the T20I fold and have him open ahead of Yashasvi Jaiswal.

Kohli, however, is known for thriving under pressure and delivering on big occasions and will hope to get that one big partnership with Rohit that has eluded the senior pair so far in the tournament.

It’s a similar case for Ravindra Jadeja, who hasn’t been among runs nor wickets in the ninth edition of the T20 World Cup, his only wicket coming in the game against Afghanistan where he had dismissed Azmatullah Omarzai. He conceded 24 runs in three overs against Bangladesh and was taken off the attack after bowling just one over, in which he conceded 17.

Read | ‘Can’t see India losing this time, England will need something extraordinary’: Collingwood

It’s highly unlikely that the Men in Blue will alter their combination at this stage of a World Cup and drop him in the semi-final for Yuzvendra Chahal. Jadeja sure brings value to the team with his fielding skills and his direct hits are as game-changing as they are a treat to watch, but he will be hoping to make that cameo with the bat that helps add another 10 runs to the Indian total or build pressure by drying up runs from his end even if he doesn’t end up collecting three or more wickets.

India’s focus, meanwhile, will be on the top order as far as their planning for England is concerned with Buttler forming quite the explosive opening partnership with Kolkata Knight Riders’ (KKR) star Phil Salt in this World Cup after his success with Alex Hales in the previous edition.

Salt had blown the Windies away with his explosive 87 not out off 47 balls, helping England chase a target of 181 down with eight wickets and nearly three overs to spare. He would then get reduced to the supporting act in England’s final Super 8 clash against the USA, where it was Buttler’s turn to dominate the opposition with an unbeaten 83 off 38 balls.

While the Jasprit Bumrah-led Indian attack will no doubt be devising the ideal plan to keep the Buttler-Salt pair quiet, they cannot afford to shift their focus away from the middle order where Harry Brook has been making some spectacular contributions and nearly helped his team defeat South Africa in St Lucia with a 37-ball 53.

What will the pitch in Guyana be like?

Scoring runs at the Providence Stadium in Georgetown has been tricky, to say the least. Even West Indies had struggled during their chase of a 137-run target set by an unfancied Papua New Guinea in their opening game of the tournament, getting reduced to 97/5 at the end of the 16th over before Roston Chase and Andre Russell got them over the line.

T20 World Cup semi-final: Frequently asked questions

The highest total at this venue in this World Cup so far is Afghanistan’s 183/5 and that came against Uganda, a team making its maiden appearance in a major cricketing event involving the Full Members. The only match involving Test-playing nations was Afghanistan vs New Zealand, in which the Afghans were restricted to 159/6 before bundling the Black Caps out for a paltry 75.

Where the second semi-final could be won

In such conditions, contributions such as Rohit’s whirlwind knock against Australia make a world of difference, and the ‘Hitman’ as well as the likes of Buttler and Salt will certainly be hoping to make the most of fielding restrictions before the likely fall in their scoring rate.

And the support for spinners should make things quite interesting, given both teams have world-class wrist-spinners in their ranks. Both Kuldeep Yadav and Adil Rashid have been potent weapons for India and England respectively, the latter getting drafted into the XI for the Caribbean leg of India’s campaign after sitting out at pace-friendly New York.

Read | Player battles to watch out for in India-England semi-final in Guyana

Rashid is England’s joint-highest wicket-taker with Jofra Archer, both having collected nine wickets each in seven games and has a better economy than the express pacer. Yadav, meanwhile, has seven wickets in just three matches and might very well have been among the leading wicket-takers had India played all of their games in the Caribbean instead of picking pace-heavy attacks in the USA.

How effective Rashid and Kuldeep are in terms of keeping the opposition batters, primarily those between Nos 3 to 7 given the stage of the innings in which they’re generally introduced, in Thursday’s fixture will likely have a major impact on the outcome of the match.

Likely XIs:

Unless one of the Indian first-team players ends up with an injury, the Men in Blue aren’t going to tinker with their combination.

England, meanwhile, have already made a big change to their attack by dropping the out-of-form Mark Wood and bringing in seam-bowling all-rounder Chris Jordan as the express pacer for the match against the USA. Jordan responded by collecting 4/10 in Barbados, his country of birth, which included a sensational hat-trick.

Captain Buttler and head coach Matthew Mott will be hoping he’s able to pull off similar heroics in the death overs. This means Wood might have to sit out of the semi-final despite his reputation, and England likely go ahead with an unchanged lineup as none of the others on the English bench — Will Jacks, Ben Duckett and Tom Hartley — are likely to get a call-up for the big match in Guyana.

India: Rohit Sharma (c), Virat Kohli, Rishabh Pant (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Shivam Dube, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav.

England: Philip Salt, Jos Buttler (c & wk), Jonny Bairstow, Harry Brook, Moeen Ali, Liam Livingstone, Sam Curran, Chris Jordan, Jofra Archer, Adil Rashid, Reece Topley.