Cricket World Cup: Favourites India take on arch-rivals Pakistan in marquee clash

Hosts India take on arch-rivals Pakistan at the Narendra Modi Stadium on Saturday in a league match of the ongoing ICC Cricket World Cup. Meenakshi Rao previews the high-octane clash between the two Asian sides.

Ahmedabad (Gujarat): A sorted India on the back of two wins – one tenacious and the other audacious – meet a lionised Pakistan high on an impossible chase against Sri Lanka on the shoulders of a fast and furious Mohammed Rizwan. Both teams have full points in the two matches they have played thus far in the 2023 World Cup, and both are looking to shrug that overwhelming monkey off their shoulder – an encounter against each other.

The setting could not have been more riveting or the occasion bigger. The chirp around the high-octane India-Pakistan match in the overwhelming confines of the biggest stadium in the world has been on a continuous climax. So, when Rohit Sharma meets Babar Azam on Saturday afternoon at Motera, both will be doing so under a well-padded pressure guard.

The equality of the two teams, however, ends right here. Rohit Sharma has many advantages over Babar Azam, both metal and on paper. Home advantage, a 7-0 record against Pakistan in World Cups and a stadium where 1,32,000 Indian fans will be bringing the house down in his support.

On the other hand, Babar Azam will be battling the No 1 team in the world and all its 1,32,000 supporters in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Ahmedabad – so, for him it depends on how good his blinkers are, how good his focus is and how good his teammates are to rise to this difficult occasion after absorbing the unprecedented pressure of being fan-less in Gujarat.

As Rohit Sharma said after his century against Afghanistan in Delhi, team India have a variety of players who plug any chinks that crop up unexpectedly during a campaign. The batting line-up is the best in the world for now; the bowling department has been on a performance high with Jasprit Bumrah striking early and in death overs while Kuldeep Yadav wristing up a sensation ball after ball. The fielding, the lesser of the three goods, has brushed itself up slowly and steadily.

India would have been a perfect team had the “no-Shubman Gill” spectre not been hanging over its otherwise all-in-place position for the big clash. However, a no-Gill situation would be as dangerous as a weak Shubman Gill in the playing 11, even though the young dengue-hit lad did join the team at Motera and practised for around an hour two days before the match.

Though India’s bench strength has emerged to be as legendary as its batting line-up, the grounded maturity of Gill’s shots has no match in a talented Ishan Kishan’s unbridled passion. Also, Shubman Gill has navigated Pakistan’s main weapon of mass destruction Shaheen Afridi hitting him out of the boundary effortlessly during the Asia Cup. His maturity in tailoring his batting to the conditions is something that his youthful compatriots lack.

Moving beyond Shubman Gill, the pitch at Motera has been a belter and is full of runs, often making the bowlers feel the heat. As the Pakistani skipper said in his pre-match press conference, “In these conditions, the margin of error for bowlers is minimal. Most matches have been high scoring matches…. I just ask my bowlers to keep hitting the length,” he said, playing down the high-pressure angle with a smile.

“There is more pressure for match tickets than the match,” Babar said amid laughs. "It is not a pressure match for us. We have played each other a lot of times. We got a lot of support in Hyderabad and we hope the same in Ahmedabad. What matters is what we can do best as a team in both batting and bowling,” the Pakistan skipper said.

Besides the pressure cooker atmosphere, what Babar Azam will most miss will be pacer Naseem Shah’s presence in the squad which will put extra responsibility on Afridi. “We will definitely miss Naseem. But we have full belief in Afridi and he has full belief in himself,” Babar said. His strategy is to keep it simple, have self-belief, plan for 10 overs at a time in ever changing conditions and block as much pressure as possible to roll out a campaign against India.

For India, too, the plan will be the same though the bigger ground and Pakistani batters’ vulnerability to turn may guide them into keeping the spin button pressed and not excluding Ravichandran Ashwin from the plan of action.

On the batting front, Rohit Sharma is fresh from a skipper’s knock breaking all records and Virat Kohli revelling in his courage and perseverance in impossible conditions. Youngsters like Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan have enough fodder to keep their wicket intact and make a mark. Against Pakistan, the strongest onslaught will come at the mouth from speedster Afridi, navigating whom safely would be the key to the proceedings for India.

Babar Azam would be advising his openers in the same vein, tasking them to first stave off the bewildering acumen of Jasprit Bumrah, who has developed the reputation of being an early striker, even on surfaces like Motera where the only thing that moves on the pitch fast is the ball to the boundary.

Babar’s bat has been under the weather but if he gets going, there is little that can stop him. Mohammed Rizwan would be riding on his century which looked good enough to him to stir some embers with controversial X posts.

At Motera, the toss will be a factor as it gets all dewy eyed under the lights here and there is a possibility of the clouds showering a break on play. But beyond the possibilities of the ground conditions, beyond the toss and beyond the strategy at play, this Saturday will be about how well the teams execute their “take it easy policy” with their minds.

India have seen the low, the blow and the flow of proceedings in the middle in their short journey in this World Cup. Saturday then would be a fest of stability and power, of emotional hold and mind control – only once these are navigated can the prowess with the bat and ball come into play.