India Look At SL Series To Sketch Blue Print For ICC World T20

With just 8 games to go before India play their opener in the World T20, many questions still need to be answered to fine tune the best playing eleven for the showpiece event. 

Virat Kohli-led Team India would begin their preparations for the ICC World T20 by taking on Sri Lanka in first shortest-format assignment of the year. Ending 2019 on a high with a hard fought win over Windies, the 'Men in Blue' yearn for consistency in the T2OIs where their form was pretty up and down last year. With just 8 games to go before India play their opener in the World T20, many questions still need to be answered to fine tune the best playing eleven for the showpiece event. What will be the opening combination, who will form the pace attack and who will lend balance to the team? With Rohit Sharma rested, opener Shikhar Dhawan get another lease of life in the shorter format to prove his pedigree up the order. Meanwhile KL Rahul has done enough to challenge Dhawan for the opener's role after a good run with the willow in 2019. In the absence of the seasoned opener Rohit Sharma , both will have a chance to prove their caliber opening the innings against the Lankans. With skipper Virat Kohli the undisputed No.3 in the middle order, rest of the slots are still up for the taking. With Shreyas Iyer reposing confidence with calm and composed knocks, Manish Pandey and Sanju Samson would look to make the most of the limited opportunities present to them. Rishabh Pant would need to do much more with the willow than his one-off eye catching innings else Samson is very much there to grab the wicket-keeper batsman's slot. One still cannot rule of the veteran MS Dhoni whose is still very much in the scheme of things. The spin armoury look quite potent with the return of the famed 'Kulcha' pair and Ravindra Jadeja and Washinton Sundar giving the team a lot of variety and depth to experiment with. Jasprit Bumrah's return with surely bolster the pace attack which has quite a few youngsters who have turned many eyes with their pace and swing. With experienced seamers Mohammad Shami and Bhuvneshwar Kumar rested, Navdeep Saini and Shardul Thakur have their task cut out to pick up wickets with the new ball. In Hardik Pandya's absence, young Shivam Dube would look to leave an impression with his hard hitting batting and medium pace. India's squad: Virat Kohli (captain), Shikhar Dhawan, KL Rahul, Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Sanju Samson, Rishabh Pant (wicket-keeper), Shivam Dube, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Navdeep Saini, Jasprit Bumrah, Washington Sundar.