South Africa has won the first and has opted to field first. Temba Bavuma has confirmed that Quinton de Kock is fit and will resume normal business. He further added "We are going to have a bowl. To be honest we are not sure how the wicket is going to play, not many stats behind it. But we are chasing well and backing our strength. We have heard it is quite a good wicket and the scores were high in the domestic games. Par score is about 180 and we are hoping the wicket gets better. We have a couple of forced changes; Rabada and Parnell miss out due to injuries, Reeza Hendricks also misses out, Quinton de Kock has recovered and is back, and Marco Jansen and Ngidi coming in. Hopefully we have a lot more (runs) coming from the top and the guys keep going in the middle."
Rishabh Pant, who is looking for yet another win along with his team lost the fourth consecutive toss and said "We were looking to bowl first. The only thing we are focusing on is our process and are not thinking this is a must-win game. We are trying to increase our run rate in the middle overs and that's what we are trying to achieve as a team. We are playing with the same team."
Will the toss matter?
Rajkot is a high-scoring ground and there isn't much dew over here and the pitch is expected to play evenly. There is a thickish layer of grass which will help the seamers. The contest is all set to be a mouth-watering treat.
Teams:
India (Playing XI): Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ishan Kishan, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant(w/c), Hardik Pandya, Dinesh Karthik, Axar Patel, Harshal Patel, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Yuzvendra Chahal, Avesh Khan
South Africa (Playing XI): Temba Bavuma(c), Quinton de Kock(w), Rassie van der Dussen, David Miller, Heinrich Klaasen, Dwaine Pretorius, Keshav Maharaj, Marco Jansen, Lungi Ngidi, Tabraiz Shamsi, Anrich Nortje
