A highly anticipated World Cup 2023 has kickstarted with England taking on New Zealand on Thursday at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad where the weather will play a crucial role like it played in the previous warm-up matches. Fans will be excited to witness a full 100 overs game as most of the warm-up games got called off due to heavy rain. The temperature in the afternoon is likely to be around 34 degrees Celsius with no forecast of rain.
The last time Ahmedabad conducted a major game was the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 final between Chennai Super Kings and Gujarat Titans earlier this year where the game finished on a ‘Reserve Day’. The iconic Narendra Modi Stadium has a total of eleven pitches, six of them made from black soil and five from red.
The dew point on Ahmedabad will be hovering around 18 degrees which states that the team who will bowl second might have to deal with a bit of a dew in the second half of the game. England captain Jos Buttler on the other hand said that winning the toss and batting first will benefit them in most of the matches in the World Cup.
“I think certainly in some games winning the toss will be advantageous. I think again it's a big skill about trying to read the pitches and read the conditions. Dew can be a big factor at certain times in India. That will be a big skill of it. I think the format is generally long enough that the toss hopefully won't make the deciding factor in the game. I think you have to play good cricket to win the match,” Buttler said on the eve of the World Cup 2023 opener on Wednesday.
The World Cup 2023 has kickstarted with the high-octane clash between England and New Zealand where the Blackcaps won the toss and have opted to field first. The English team have lost two wickets are current score stands at England 77/2 after 15.1 overs(at the time of writing).