India vs England 2021, 3rd T20I: Match Preview And Prediction

The third match of the five-match T20I series between the hosts India and the visitors England will be played this Tuesday (16th March) night at Narendra Modi Stadium (Motera, Ahmedabad). Due to the latest circumstances, the forthcoming matches of this series will be now played behind closed doors.

Currently, this T20I series is standing in the 1-1 position with three matches to go. While England won the opening match of this series by 8 wickets, India won the next game by 7 wickets.

India vs England 2021, 3rd T20I: Match Preview

India

After suffering a thrashing defeat in the first T20I, the hosts India have made a solid comeback in this series by winning the second game of this series in good style.

The limited-overs vice-captain Rohit Sharma is likely to come back in the T20I playing XI, who was rested for the first two matches of this series. While KL Rahul’s weak form is a tough picture for the Indian team, they are happy with the strong T20I debut from Ishan Kishan who won the Player of the Match award in the last game for scoring 56 runs.

After two consecutive ducks, captain Virat Kohli gave a big relief to the team and fans with his match-winning batting performance in the last game where he scored 73 not out off 49 balls. Shreyas Iyer is also in very good form with the bat who scored 67 runs in the first T20I. Rishabh Pant and Hardik Pandya are the crucial middle-order batsmen in this team.

In the last game, bowlers played a big role in India’s victory as it was completely the team bowling effort. While Washington Sundar and Shardul Thakur got two wickets each in the second T20I, Bhuvneshwar Kumar provided his familiar early breakthrough.

Full Squad

Virat Kohli (C), Rohit Sharma (vc), KL Rahul, Shikhar Dhawan, Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya, Rishabh Pant (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Yuzvendra Chahal, Varun Chakravarthy (doubtful for the entire series), Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Rahul Tewatia, T Natarajan (doubtful due to fitness issue), Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Deepak Chahar, Navdeep Saini, Shardul Thakur.

England

After claiming a big victory in the opening game of this T20I series, the visitors England suffered a smart defeat in the second game of this series.

Opener Jason Roy is in superb form with the bat who scored 49 and 46 runs respectively in the first two matches of this series. Most of the other batsmen got some good starts in this series but they need to play much bigger roles as many 20s are not enough to challenge the strong T20I sides like India.

Fast bowler Mark Wood missed the last game due to injury and England captain Eoin Morgan admitted that they missed him in the last game. But England can add a spinner in the playing XI as Motera pitches are helpful for the slow bowlers, especially when they already have four other pace-bowling options, including the all-rounder Ben Stokes. Jofra Archer, Chris Jordan and Adil Rashid are the very important names in this T20I bowling side.

Full Squad

Eoin Morgan (C), Moeen Ali, Jofra Archer, Jonny Bairstow, Sam Billings, Jos Buttler (wk), Tom Curran, Sam Curran, Chris Jordan, Liam Livingstone, Dawid Malan, Adil Rashid, Jason Roy, Ben Stokes, Reece Topley, Mark Wood

India vs England 2021, 3rd T20I: Match Prediction

As this series is currently standing in the 1-1 position, both teams are desperate to move ahead in this series by winning the third game. While the chasing teams won the first two matches very comfortably, toss can play a crucial role on Tuesday night too.