Ahmedabad: The T20 World Cup has entered the Super 8 phase. The tournament was designed to calm business nerves among seeded teams, but it has lost some of its organic charm along the way. The Indian and South African teams from the previous finals have arrived in Ahmedabad for a new round of matches. Unlike the second round of the World Cup in other sports, the day has been well planned for at this venue ever since the ICC announced the fixtures at the end of November. All they have to do is avoid upsets against assistants and lower-ranked teams in the first two weeks of play.
Push boundaries with our YouTube channel. Subscribe now!
Now that both sides have suffered at least one scare in the group stages, they will appear in front of a packed crowd on Sunday night with few excuses and unrelenting expectations. The championship is in “no room for let-down territory.” “If I were in this situation (to decide the schedule), I would definitely try and tweak it,” confessed India captain Suryakumar Yadav about the pre-seeded side. The financial scars from the 2003 and 2007 ODI World Cups still haunt the sport’s administrators. To prevent this from happening, this format reduces the element of surprise in global events.
familiarity factor
Familiarity with the conditions and opponents will be the last concern for both camps, having played the Indian team just a few months ago. South Africa, for example, have already played three games at this venue going into this match, with another game due after Sunday.
“I think almost all the players have played N games in Ahmedabad. Even the Indian team has played a lot of games here. It will be a good 50-50 game,” Surya said on the eve of the match. But he was also quick to mention that the presence of overseas players in franchises largely negates the home field advantage.
“We know which teams we are playing against. And we also have a lot of days between previous games. So, we have a good time to prepare for each team,” Surya said, stressing the benefits of the pre-seeding games.
South Africa goalkeeper Quinton de Kock says that familiarity can be a double-edged sword. “It’s going to be a pretty good game tomorrow because we’ve played a lot against each other in the last two months. To be honest, the team hasn’t really changed that much. We’ve played against each other a lot in the IPL. So, it’s just a matter of who breaks down under the pressure first, on the field,” de Kock claimed.
Proceed with caution
Surya has never denied the pressure of playing a World Cup at home from the start of his campaign, let alone defending his title. For the first time since becoming India’s T20I captain, he eschewed his characteristic quips at the media briefing on Saturday night. “I never said we didn’t have any fears. I just said we weren’t worried about anything,” he corrected the media firmly.
He did not deny the rumors that the law of averages is catching up with India after their insane performances in the ICC white-ball tournament over the past two years. He also didn’t downplay the fact that the championship loss to the United States had shaken the team’s core strategy. The Mumbai jailbreak has grounded Suriya’s bunch of ambitious T20 hitmen. “Ever since that Team USA game, we haven’t thought too much about planning how to start our Super 8 campaign. We started thinking more about the next day, taking it one step at a time. There will be pressure. If there is no pressure, there won’t be any fun playing this game,” Surya said.
black clay court
South Africa completely bruised the pride of Indian cricket when they swept the two Test matches in India in November. They exposed India’s vulnerability against spin, and interestingly, even during this World Cup, spin continues to be a point of discussion. De Kock bluntly mentioned that he had not seen any turnaround at this venue in the previous three games.
On Sunday, curators will roll out 22 yards of ground made of black soil. The clay courts have been preserved beneath a layer of lush green grass. TOI understands that the team has found that clay courts generally have better bounce than black clay courts in the second Test in Guwahati, which will work in South Africa’s favour. Those whispers suggest that SENA teams are more comfortable with bigger bounces, even if the pitch is in rotation or play is slow. The Indian team has been training for two days on the black earth pitch in the central square here.
Surya enters the most crucial week of his captaincy career. The preparation couldn’t have been better. Now, as de Kock says, it all comes down to who blinks first!
