Mumbai, Dec 19
India lost their fourth toss in four on the tour of South Africa, and were asked to bat first on a fresh pitch with the Easterly wind blowing, which is generally the bowling wind in Gqeberha.
South Africa were forced to make changes with injuries to Andile Phehlukwayo and Ottniel Baartman. Beuran Hendricks came in at the last moment, and Lizaad Williams replaced left-arm wristspinner Tabraiz Shamsi, which might suggest South Africa don’t expect it to the usual slow and low surface. India handed out another debut as Shreyas Iyer moved out to link up with the Test team. Rinku Singh was preferred to Rajat Patidar in the ODIs after he impressed in the T20Is too. The rest of the XI remained unchan-ged.
India led the series 1-0 after having drawn the T20Is 1-1. The surface had a lot of grass to try to hold together the cracks on the pitch. The big boundaries added to it meant a big score wasn’t a guarantee. India: 1 Ruturaj Gaikwad, 2 B Sai Sudharsan, 3 Tilak Varma, 4 KL Rahul (capt & wk), 5 Sanju Samson, 6 Rinky Singh, 7 Axar Patel, 8 Kuldeep Yadav, 9 Arshdeep Singh, 10 Avesh Khan, 11 Mukesh Kumar
South Africa 1 Tony de Zorzi, 2 Reeza Hendricks, 3 Rassie van der Dussen, 4 Aiden Markram (capt), 5 H Klaasen (wk), 6 David Miller, 7 Wiaan Mulder, 8 Keshav Maharaj, 9 Nandre Burger, 10 Lizaad Williams, 11 Beuran Hendricks
