New Delhi: India have won the toss and opted to field first in the second and final T20I of the series against Ireland at the Civil Service Cricket Club in Belfast on Sunday, June 28. The Men in Blue have made two changes to their playing XI with debutants Prince Yadav and Suryansh Shedge replacing Prasidh Krishna and Washington Sundar.
They are the 120th and 121st debutants for India in T20Is; only Pakistan have had more caps (125) in this format. There is still no place for Vaibhav Sooryavanshi in the playing XI as the team management decided to continue with the opening pair of Abhishek Sharma and Sanju Samson.
Iyer praised both the debutans at the toss and said that it’s important for them to play smart cricket. He also lauded Ireland’s performance in the first T20I and said that they were pretty smart in making the bowling changes and also scoring off the back foot and front foot.
“Yeah, we’ve got two changes. Suryansh Shedge and Prince Yadav come in. Both are making the debut. So these are the two changes we’ve made. [On debutant Shedge] He’s a powerful, destructive batter. Yes, he’s a sensational youngster who has been scoring runs in the domestic cricket and also in the IPL,” Shreyas said at the toss.
“Definitely it’s Prince Yadav’s first game, so I don’t want to put him under that much pressure. It’s important that he comes out here and experiences and gain the experience out of what is there to offer. And he must have seen the match, how we played in the previous game. So definitely he’s smart enough to adapt to it,” he added.
Playing XIs of India and Ireland for 2nd T20I
India: Abhishek Sharma, Sanju Samson(w), Ishan Kishan, Shreyas Iyer(c), Tilak Varma, Shivam Dube, Suryansh Shedge, Axar Patel, Harshit Rana, Arshdeep Singh, Prince Yadav.
Ireland: Tim Tector, Ross Adair, Harry Tector, Lorcan Tucker(w/c), Benjamin Calitz, Gareth Delany, George Dockrell, Liam McCarthy, Matthew Humphreys, Jai Moondra, Matthew Hollard.