Asia Cup 2016: India vs Bangladesh, Match 1 – Preview

Major concern for Men in Blue is uncertainty over their skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s availability.

New Delhi: India will take on hosts Bangladesh in the Asia Cup opener on Wednesday at Shere Bangla National Stadium, Mirpur. (Asia Cup 2016: FULL COVERGAE)

Major concern for the Men in Blue is the uncertainty over their skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s availability.

During the team’s training session on Sunday, Dhoni suffered a muscle spasm, which forced the BCCI to call Parthiv Patel as his back-up.

Though Indian team is looking in good form, first encounter against Bangladesh is a tricky one as the Tigers have built a reputation of being giant-slayers especially in front of the home crowd.

In Wednesday's clash, both the teams will look to start their Asia Cup campaign on a winning note.

Revenge would certainly be on the minds of MS Dhoni & Co as they were beaten by Bangladesh in a three-ODI series at the same venue last year.

Indian batsmen will also look to crack the code to play left-arm pacer Mustafizur Rahaman, who hurt India badly last time.

After winning two T20I series on the bounce against Australia and Sri Lanka, morale of the Indian team would be all time high.

In the six T20 internationals played this year, India have won five of them with the only defeat coming against Sri Lanka on an unusual Pune pitch in the last series.

Indian batting order looks set with having Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli in the top order.

In the middle order they have specialist batsmen in Suresh Raina, Yuvraj Singh and Dhoni.

Ravindra Jadeja, Hardik Pandya and R Ashwin in the lower order make the Indian batting line up quite solid and deep.

As far as Indian bowling line up is concerned, they have pacers like Ashish Nehra and Jasprit Bumrah in their ranks, apart from premier spinners in Ashwin and Jadeja.

If we see the Bangladesh squad then their strength is certainly their bowling attack with Mustafizur, Taskin Ahmed and Al-Amin Hossain expected to pose a lot of challenge for the Indian batsmen.

Then they have two experienced campaigners in skipper Mashrafe Mortaza and all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan as well.

Opening match of the Asia Cup is expected to be a tight match.  

Squads

India: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (captain and wk), Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, Yuvraj Singh, Ravindra Jadeja, Hardik Pandya, Ashish Nehra, Ravichandran Ashwin, Jasprit Bumrah, Ajinkya Rahane, Harbhajan Singh, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Pawan Negi, Parthiv Patel.

Bangladesh: Mashrafe Mortaza (captain), Imrul Kayes, Nurul Hasan, Soumya Sarkar, Nasir Hosain, Shabbir Rahaman, Mahmudullah Riyadh, Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), Shakib Al Hasan, Al-Amin Hossain, Taskin Ahmed, Mustafizur Rahaman, Abu Hider, Mohammed Mithun, Arafat Sunny.

Match timing: 7:00 PM (IST)