New Zealand vs India 1st T20 Live Match Score
When: New Zealand vs India, 1st T20I, Feb 06, 08:00 PM local time, 12:30 PM IST
Where: Westpac Stadium, Wellington
What to expect: At the Westpac stadium, pacers have generally found swing. It can be encapsulated by Tim Southee’s success (eight scalps at 13.77 in T20Is) at the stadium. Teams have preferred to chase, evidenced by eight out of nine captains who won the toss in T20Is at the stadium, electing to field.
Team News:
India: With Virat Kohli rested for the series, Rohit Sharma will continue to lead the side. India could play both MS Dhoni and Pant for the first game. Shubman Gill is also an option to look at.
Probable XI: Rohit Sharma (c), Shikhar Dhawan, Rishabh Pant, Shubman Gill, MS Dhoni (wk), Dinesh Karthik, Hardik Pandya, Krunal Pandya/ Yuzvendra Chahal, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Kuldeep Yadav, Siddarth Kaul/Khaleel Ahmed
New Zealand: With Martin Guptill ruled out of the rubber, Tim Seifert, who has a very good strike rate in T20s, might slot in at the top of the order. However, he hasn’t found success at the highest level so far. Tim Southee and Scott Kuggeleign would also would come into the equation.
Probable XI: Tim Seifert, Colin Munro, Kane Williamson (c), Ross Taylor, Colin de Grandhomme, Jimmy Neesham, Mitchell Santner, Doug Bracewell, Tim Southee, Ish Sodhi/Scott Kuggeleign, Lockie Ferguson
Stats and Trivia
New Zealand are the only team to win more matches than they have lost against India – six wins to two defeats.
Rohit Sharma needs 36 more runs to go past Martin Guptill’s tally of 2272 runs to become the leading run-getter in T20 Internationals.
The average first innings total in New Zealand since January 2016 is 183 – the highest among all the nations.
Teams:
India (From): Rohit Sharma(c), Shikhar Dhawan, Rishabh Pant, Shubman Gill, MS Dhoni(w), Dinesh Karthik, Hardik Pandya, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Siddarth Kaul, Krunal Pandya, K Khaleel Ahmed, Vijay Shankar, Kedar Jadhav
New Zealand (From): Colin Munro, Tim Seifert(w), Kane Williamson(c), Ross Taylor, Colin de Grandhomme, James Neesham, Mitchell Santner, Doug Bracewell, Tim Southee, Ish Sodhi, Lockie Ferguson, Scott Kuggeleijn, Daryl MitchellOn the other hand, the visiting Indian side would be riding high on confidence. Surety has replaced vulnerability with India not losing a single series across formats since they went down 1-4 to England in the Test rubber last year.
With Opener Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan at the top batting of the order, the tourists have a settled opening pair. The aggressive batsman Rishabh Pant, who was left out of the ODI squad, is back in the set-up. With the old hero hand MS Dhoni also in the setup, it would be interesting to see where Pant would fit in. With all-rounders – Hardik and Krunal Pandya, alongside chalak Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav and Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the ranks, India also have enough firepower in the bowling department.
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