India vs Sri Lanka Nidahas Trophy 1st T20, New faces with new roles

1st T20 match of Nidahas trophy will be played between India vs Sri Lanka on today at Colombo. Team India is the favourite of this tournament–without their lead batsman and regular skipper Virat Kohli, MS Dhoni, Hardik Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah and Kuldeep Yadav. Some new faces: Deepak Hooda, Rishabh Pant, Vijay Shankar and Washington Sundar have been selected for this Nidahas Trophy to fulfil the place of regular players. There is a special moment for the Indian team to improve their ratings in t20 cricket as well. Currently, Team India is at no 3 in T20 Rankings, and by the end of this tri-series, India might be on Top. So from the ranking point of view, India is considering this challenge primarily.

From the Sri-lankan side, All-rounder Angelo Mathews has been ruled out from this series due to his injury while Niroshan Dickwella ignored for the series, so only Kusal Perera is set to take over the wicketkeeping duties on Tuesday. Apart from that, the hosts might not look to change much with their combination. The responsibility of opening partnership should be active on the shoulders of Upul Tharanga and Kusal Mendia while Lakmal and Pradeep will lead the Sri-Lankan pace-attack.

Star Batsman, Lokesh Rahul will play at No-3. Meanwhile, Raina will be available on No.4. Indian opening will be started by Shikhar Dhawan and Skipper Rohit Sharma, and Shardul and Udanakat will start the bowling charge. The absence of star players of India could be a great chance for Srilanka to improve their team record against India. This is the Probable XI for the 1st T20 match.

Probable XI: Rohit Sharma (c), Shikhar Dhawan, KL Rahul, Suresh Raina, Manish Pandey, Dinesh Karthik, Vijay Shankar/Washington Sundar, Axar Patel, Shardul Thakur, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jaydev Unadkat

Probable XI: Upul Tharanga, Kusal Mendis, Kusal Perera, Dinesh Chandimal (c), Dhananjaya de Silva, Thisara Perera, Dasun Shanaka, Jeevan Mendis, Akila Dananjaya, Suranga Lakmal, Nuwan Pradeep