Asia Cup 2018 - India Predicted Squad

The 14th edition of the Asia Cup is just around the corner. The clash of the Asian teams will commence on 15 September 2018 and will come to a close with the final that will be played on 28 September 2018. The United Arab Emirates will be hosting this tournament nearly after 23 years. Team India, the defending champions will go in as the favourites into this tournament.

The Asia Cup is to be played right after India’s tour of England. Considering the importance of the tournament the team will want to field all the high-profile players. Each team can play a maximum of 6 matches if they go all the way through. It thus forms an important part of plans considering there are only 15 odd matches they will play before the World Cup 2019 in England. Hence, they will want to use it to understand the combination and get a most suited XI in place as well.

Here is the Predicted India squad for the Asia Cup 2018:

Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma will be going in as the first-choice openers. The selectors would have no hesitations for the responsibility at the top of the order. Also, both these men fared decently well in the 3-match ODI series against England. Rohit also scored a century in that series. KL Rahul, who failed to match the expectations in the England series could be the third opener in the squad rather than a middle-order batsman.

Without a second thought, the ever-reliable Virat Kohli will continue at the No. 3 position and will also lead the side. Along with him, Shreyas Iyer, Dinesh Karthik will be the other men to take up the middle order roles. This leaves space for one more spot – Kedar Jadhav, Suresh Raina and Ambati Rayudu are the men in contention for the one place. But, Jadhav, who seems to have regained his fitness is the favourite to make it into the final squad provided he clears the yo-yo hurdle.

Another topic of discussion will be MS Dhoni‘s batting position. He is no longer the finisher that he was and needs more time to get going. It is essential to fit him in the top four as he has struggled quite a lot when batting lower down the order in recent few games.

Axar Patel and Hardik Pandya will be the all-rounders in the squad. Axar hasn’t done much wrong of late. It is just that he isn’t getting as many chances as he would have liked. Hence, he should make it to the squad also as another spin-bowling option. Hardik, as we all know, is an important member of the India XI and will play most matches.

Given the workload and keeping the injury-factors in mind, India could go with four seamers in the squad. With Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Jasprit Bumrah being the first choice pair, Umesh Yadav and Shardul Thakur will be the other two seamers. The spin department, as usual, will be taken care by the wrist-spin duo of Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav.

Here is the expected 16-member squad:

Virat Kohli (C), Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, MS Dhoni (wk), Shreyas Iyer, Dinesh Karthik, Kedar Jadhav, Axar Patel, Hardik Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah, Umesh Yadav, Shardul Thakur, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav.

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