Pink is the colour often associated with love, sweetness, and compassion. The colour evokes feelings of warmth and tenderness. Pink is the colour that will adorn the “BULLRING” Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg this Sunday, as the home side takes on India in the first one-day international. This match will mark the seasonal pink day of the South African summer.
Contrasting to the nature of the colour pink, the Pink ODI has never been a calm and sweet fixture. From De Villiers putting up the fastest one-day innings of all time to Chris Morris’ heroics in a one-wicket win against England. From a swarm of bees descending on the bullring in 2017 to De Kock deceiving Fakhar Zaman into getting runout at 193 and who can forget Heinrich Klaasen’s arrival on the international stage in 2018. The pink odi at the Bullring has seen it all. Tomorrow the fans will hope for something similar.
South Africa
A transition phase frequently characterised the end of a 4-year cycle of an ODI World Cup. By the time the next ODI World Cup takes place in South Africa, Miller will be 37, Rassie will be 38, Klaasen will be 35, the no. 1 ODI bowler Maharaj will be 37 & the likes of Rabada & Nortje will be in their early 30s. Now South Africa will not be looking to replace all these players as many of them are currently in their prime and showed it in the World Cup, but they’ll need some youthful faces to accompany them.
Many of such young potentially talented players have been included in the ODI squad for this series & their performance will be the desirable thing to watch out for in this series.
With the retirement of Quinton de Kock & Bavuma being rested for this series, South Africa will look for a fresh new opening pair to accompany their strong middle order. Tony de Zorzi, the left-handed 26-year-old top-order batsman who made his international debut earlier this year can be an option for South Africa at the top.
The pace attack comprising unfamiliar names like Nandre Burger, Ottniel Baartman & all-rounder Mihlali Mpongwana will have a tough job to do when they face a young and solid Indian batting lineup which proved to be too good for South Africa in T20Is. Kyle Verreyne is another player who will be keen to prove his worth in the role of wicketkeeper if given a chance.
Probable Playing XI: Aiden Markram (c), Reeza Hendricks, Tony de Zorzi, Rassie Van der Dussen, Heinrich Klaasen (wk), David Miller, Andile Phehlukwayo, Keshav Maharaj, Nandre Burger, Lizard Williams, Tabraiz Shamsi.
India
The Indian ODI team witnessed its peak in the ODI World Cup, yet they couldn’t win the title. Management and the board must be wondering what else they can do in this format to lift that silverware. The board of selectors has picked a relatively younger and inexperienced odi team for this tour led by the captain KL Rahul, who himself will want to keep his place in the team for as long as he can. Recently, he indicated changing his role to a middle-order batsman in all formats to have a better chance of getting selected for India in the future.
Sai Sudarshan, Rinku Singh & Rajat Patidar alongside medium pacer Akash Deep will be potential debutants for this series. Deepak Chahar will not be featuring because of a family medical emergency.
India did not have a single left-handed batsman on their team during the World Cup but for this series, they’ve 3 and all 3 are young players who have a chance to be a contender for the mainstream odi side by performing well. Yuzvendra Chahal is making a comeback to the odi side after 11 months.
Probable Playing XI: KL Rahul (c) (wk), Ruturaj Gaikwad, Sai Sudarshan, Shreyas Iyer, Tilak Verma, Rinku Singh, Axar Patel, Avesh Khan, Kuldeep Yadav/Yuzvendra Chahal, Mukesh Kumar, Arshdeep Singh.
Venue & Expectations
In recent years, Johannesburg has been a very high-scoring venue in white ball cricket. The average first innings score here in the last 5 outings is touching 300, including scores of 315, 341 & 370 in 3 of them. With Klaasen, Markram & Miller in the team, South Africa will be expected to score over 300 if they bat first. India too can give a tough challenge to South Africa with the bat with some good and exciting names in their lineup.
Dream11 Team for SA vs IND 1st ODI 2023
Note: This is not our final Dream11 Team as we are not aware of the Toss Result/Final Playing XI of both teams at this moment.
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