India will definitely not be complacent, especially given what happened during the ICC Champions Trophy 2017. India had beaten their rivals by 124 runs (DLS method) in the group stage, and were favourites for the title, but Pakistan stormed back in the final, famously winning by 180 runs.
In their previous match-up, Pakistan were far from at their best. Their batsmen, apart from Babar Azam and Shoaib Malik to an extent, crumbled all too easily, and they were bundled for 162. Then, once Rohit Sharma, the India captain, was allowed to settle in, there was only going to be one outcome.
A batting effort more representative of Pakistan’s capabilities was on display in their next match against Afghanistan, where all of Imam-ul-Haq, Azam and Malik scored half-centuries to power them in a nervy chase – they won by three wickets, negating the threat of Rashid Khan and Mujeeb Ur Rahman.
The real point of concern for Pakistan is fatigue. That game against Afghanistan went down to the wire, which would have been exhausting both mentally and physically. Furthermore, that was played in Abu Dhabi, and they would have had to make the trip to Dubai the next day. India, meanwhile, have no such concerns, being based in Dubai.
Squad
India: Rohit Sharma (c), Shikhar Dhawan, Khaleel Ahmed, Jasprit Bumrah, Yuzvendra Chahal, MS Dhoni (wk), Kedar Jadhav, Dinesh Karthik, Kuldeep Yadav, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Manish Pandey, KL Rahul, Ambati Rayudu, Ravindra Jadeja, Deepak Chahar, Siddarth Kaul
Pakistan: Sarfraz Ahmed (c & wk), Fakhar Zaman, Shoaib Malik, Mohammad Amir, Shadab Khan, Imam ul Haq, Shan Masood, Babar Azam, Asif Ali, Haris Sohail, Mohammad Nawaz, Fahim Ashraf, Hasan Ali, Junaid Khan, Usman Shinwari, Shaheen Afridi
