PAK vs IND 3rd Super Four Match Prediction

PAK vs IND Team Previews

Pakistan

Pakistan will be pretty happy with the way they have performed so far. They topped the Group A table and began their Super 4 journey with a thumping win over Bangladesh. However, playing against India is a different ballgame altogether and the team will have to bring out its A-game.

Imam Ul-Haq and Mohammad Rizwan scored individual half-centuries in the last match and that should take off some of the scoring pressure of Babar Azam. Nevertheless, Babar is in prime form and will revel under the pressure of a high-intensity match.

The form of Agha Salman and Fakhar Zaman is a bit of a concern though.

Pakistan chose to play Faheem Ashraf in the previous match instead of Mohammad Nawaz, amd the same may be the case for this contest also. Having Faheem Ashraf at 8 makes a big difference to the batting depth. Having this extra batter allows Pakistan to attack more or recover from early losses.

Pakistan lacks a quality spinner who can keep a cap on the scoring rate during the middle overs and also pick up wickets. While Shadab Khan has bowled well in patches, his performance has been far from ideal. The conditions have not helped him much so far.

This makes Pakistan heavily dependent on its pace attack to deliver. Shaheen Shah Afridi, Haris Rauf, and Naseem Shah make up for a fierce pace attack and will be eager to once again rattle the Indian openers. A relentless attacking nature of the Pakistani bolwing attack ensures that they always look for wickets.

Pakistan is the world's number one cricket team and there is a reason for that. It should not be underestimated by anyone. 

India

India will look to improve its performance as it plays their arch-rivals at an important stage in the preparation for the upcoming ODI World Cup.

The team’s performance has been far from perfect so far on this tour. The first match saw a collapse of the top-order batsmen, where if not for a gritty partnership between Ishan Kishan and Hardik Pandya, the team would have been bundled for a sub-par score. 

India's top order was very tentative in the previous match and did not take the game to the Pakistani pacers. We exect to see a bit more inititative in this match.

The second match saw a mediocre bowling effort as Nepal got away with way too many runs than the skipper Rohit Sharma would’ve liked. The fielding effort, in particulasr, was terrible and the bowling also seemed lacklustre.

Nevertheless, there are a couple of positives too. Shubhman Gill and Sharma put up an unbeaten 147-run partnership in the match against Nepal and got some runs under their belt. However, it remains to be seen how they cope with the quality pace attack from Pakistan.

India has to think about its team selection as well. KL Rahul is available for selection but Ishan Kishan is in great form as well. Shreyas Iyer seems to be a bit vulnerable but we hope he will get another game to prove his worth.

The lack of batting depth remains a big problem for India. If they lose early wickets, they will be unable to attack at the end. The return of Jasprit Bumrah since the match against Nepal will add bite to the pace attack, while Kuldeep Yadav and Ravindra Jadeja remain the two spinners on the team.

India's bowling was poor against Nepal and needs to raise its game.