Asia Cup 2022: Afghanistan wins toss, chooses to bowl first vs India

Afghanistan won the toss and chose to bowl first in a dead rubber against India in the Asia Cup 2022. Both teams have already gone out of the continental tournament, however, will still face each other in their final match in Dubai. It is also the final Super 4 match of the Asia Cup 2022.

“We will bowl first. We left the game immediately and went to the hotel last night. Took a few sleeping pills, it was a tough night. We have played well in the tournament, we could have won the last two games. We will try our best to play some good cricket,” Afghanistan captain Mohammad Nabi said.

Also Read: What went wrong for India in Asia Cup 2022

India, on the other hand, will be captained by KL Rahul in the game as Rohit Sharma has been rested in the match. Apart from Rohit, the Indian team will also be missing Yuzvendra Chahal and Hardik Pandya in the match.

“We wanted to bat first. We want to challenge ourselves as a batting unit. Rohit wants to take a break, playing back-to-back is not easy in these conditions. Yuzi (Chahal), Rohit and Hardik miss out. Chahar, Karthik and Axar come in,” Rahul said.

“Even coming into this tournament, we had the T20 World Cup in mind. It’s a good learning for us to play such a tournament before the World Cup. We have learnt a few things from the losses. Trying to finalise the roles that each individual will play in the World Cup,” he added.

India began the Asia Cup 2022 impressively with a win over arch-rivals Pakistan in the opening match. They replicated their winning performance in the next match against Hong Kong. However, the Men in Blue were handed two consecutive defeats in the Super 4s when they were beaten by Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

On the other hand, Afghanistan beat Sri Lanka and Bangladesh in the group stages. However, were defeated by Sri Lanka and Pakistan in the Super 4. 

Also Read: Asia Cup 2022: Breaking down Kusal Mendis, Pathum Nissanka’s partnership vs India

Lineups:

India:  KL Rahul (captain), Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant (wk), Deepak Hooda, Dinesh Karthik, Axar Patel, Ravichandran Ashwin, Deepak Chahar, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Arshdeep Singh

Afghanistan: Hazratullah Zazai, Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Ibrahim Zadran, Najibullah Zadran, Mohammad Nabi (captain), Karim Janat, Rashid Khan, Azmatullah Omarzai, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Fareed Ahmad Malik, Fazalhaq Farooqi