With less than a year to go to the ODI World Cup, India and New Zealand will lock horns in a crucial five-match series, starting November 4 at Eden Park in Auckland on Wednesday.
The focus will rest on India’s vaunted top-order but Shubman Gill’s men will have more pressing issues at hand, particularly with the lower order and a fledgling pace attack. Short dimensions at the high-scoring venue could mean that India could continue to stack in all-rounders, meaning wrist-spinner Kuldeep Yadav could still be sidelined after missing out on all five T20Is on the tour so far.
With captain Gill having confirmed that the top-four is all but fixed, India could field two all-rounders in Naman Dhir and Axar Patel in floating options down the order. With Mohammed Siraj just joining the squad after his stint in the second unofficial Test for India A against New Zealand A, the Men in Blue could start with a relatively young pace unit.
India Predicted Playing XI: Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill (c), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer (vc), KL Rahul (wk), Axar Patel, Naman Dhir, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Anshul Kamboj, Gurnoor Brar, Arshdeep Singh.
New Zealand Predicted Playing XI: Tim Seifert, Will Young, Daryl Mitchell, Tom Latham (wk), Glenn Phillips, Michael Bracewell, Mitchell Santner (c), Nathan Smith, Kyle Jamieson, Jacob Duffy, Matt Henry.
IND vs NZ – 1st ODI Squads
New ZealandSquad: Henry Nicholls, Will Young, Tom Latham(w), Daryl Mitchell, Glenn Phillips, Michael Bracewell, Mitchell Santner(c), Matt Henry, Jacob Duffy, Nathan Smith, Matthew Fisher, Blair Tickner, Tim Seifert, Kyle Jamieson.
IndiaSquad: Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill(c), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul(w), Nitish Kumar Reddy, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Anshul Kamboj, Mohammed Siraj, Arshdeep Singh, Gurnoor Brar, Naman Dhir, Auqib Nabi, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ishan Kishan.