In good news for cricket fans all over the world, the weather report for the India-Bangladesh clash at Edgbaston on July 2 has ruled out any chance of rain throughout the day. There will be clouds in the sky but the chances of rain are almost zero with the temperature ranging between 9 degrees Celcius to 17 degrees Celcius.
Pitch Report
The condition of the pitch as seen in the last match between England and India will give advantage to the team batting first as it is a mostly flat track with the ball not coming to bat in the second innings. However, considering the cloud cover both the teams could opt to bowl first.
Match Preview
India faced their first defeat in the ICC Cricket World Cup at the hands of England on June 30 at the Edgbaston stadium. They are now second on the table with eleven points and a win away from a semi-final berth. The Men in Blue lost the match by 31 runs as they fell short of the formidable target of 338 given by the hosts to chase.
Mohammed Shami took five wickets but was a little bit expensive as he gave away 69 runs in his quota of 10 overs. But the problem India faced was their spinners getting battered by the English batsmen who mercilessly treated them and took their total post 300.
Another problem which came out into the open was India's dependency on Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli and the underperformance of the middle-order with the likes of MS Dhoni, Kedar Jadhav consistently failing to deliver. Both of them struggled to take the fight to the end and were heavily criticised by cricket fans all over the world.
India need to fix their middle-order in the Bangladesh match as The Tigers are in good form in this tournament. Virat Kohli has his hands full as he needs to select the perfect playing XI with India aiming to seal the semi-final berth by defeating Bangladesh.
On the other hand, Bangladesh won their last game against Afghanistan defeating them by 62 runs. Shakib Al Hasan again delighted the Tigers fans with a stellar performance both with bat and bowl. He scored yet another half-century in the tournament besides picking up another five-wicket haul. He has scored 476 runs and has scalped 10 wickets till now in the tournament. The current world number one all-rounder in ODIs is having the form of his life and is playing a major part in Bangladesh's success in the tournament.
Other than him, Mushfiqur Rahim, Liton Das, Mustafizur all of them have been in good form chipping in when the team required them to. Bangladesh have won three out of their seven games played and are sixth on the points table with seven points. They will definitely give a tough fight against India to move one step closer to a semi-final berth.
Match Predictions
India definitely have the upper hand over Bangladesh both on paper and on field as per the performance in the World Cup so far. The Men in Blue are favourite to win but they can face a major upset as Bangladesh have beaten South Africa and West Indies in the ongoing tournament.
