The USA’s motley crew of aspirants faces the T20 World Cup’s strongest team in its opening fixture when it steps onto the field at the Wankhede Stadium on February 7. India, ranked No 1 in T20Is and defending champions, have an easy run in the first round but will be aware of what USA can do, given the Associate member team beat Pakistan in the previous edition.
Ranked 18th, USA automatically qualified for the 2024 T20 World Cup as co-hosts. This time around, they’re back on the basis of strong performance up to April 2025 – which is the last time USA played T20Is, owing to the ICC suspending USA Cricket. Their group comprises India, Pakistan, Netherlands, and Namibia, so getting off the ground running is imperative.
USA have a bunch of players who plied their trade in India, three of whom were born Mumbai – Saurabh Netravalkar, Harmeet Singh, and Shubham Ranjane. Nethravalkar, a former India Under-19 player, was at the forefront of USA’s Super Over win over Pakistan in 2024, and also dismissed Virat Kohli two years ago. Another player who stood out at the last World Cup is Andries Gous, who recently scored the ILT20’s highest score – 120* for winners Desert Vipers.
India are coming off a 4-1 series victory over New Zealand and look unchallenged heading into the Super Eights. An India A team beat USA this week, and when then South Africa were downed by the 30 runs in the second warm-up game.
With Tilak Varma back, India turn into an even better team. Out of action for over a month, Tilak slammed 38 off 34 balls against USA and 45 off 19 versus South Africa. Ishan Kishan has knocked off Sanju Samson from the starting 11, and so he will keep wickets and open with Abhishek Sharma. India bat deep, with Axar Patel likely to come in at No 8, followed by three wicket-takers in Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh and Varun Chakravarthy.
This appears a mismatch on paper, given the rusty nature of USA’s T20I cricket and India’s utter dominance.
India likely 11: 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Ishan Kishan (wk), 3 Tilak Varma, 4 Suryakumar Yadav (capt), 5 Hardik Pandya, 6 Rinku Singh, 7 Shivam Dube, 8 Axar Patel, 9 Jasprit Bumrah, 10 Arshdeep Singh, 11 Varun Chakravarthy
USA likely 11: 1 Andries Gous, 1 Monank Patel (capt/wk), 3 Saiteja Mukkamalla, 4 Milind Kumar, 5 Sanjay Krishnamurthi, 6 Shubham Ranjane, 7 Harmeet Singh, 8 Mohammad Mohsin, 10 Ali Khan, 11 Saurabh Netravalkar
