Can 2024 Script India T20 World Cup Win?

After looking at India's performance in the last match against Pakistan, where they defeated the arch-rivals by 6 runs in the last over of the game. It would not be wrong to say that the Indian team are looking forward to lifting their second ICC Men’s T20 World Cup trophy under the leadership of Rohit Sharma, who has proved himself by helping Men in Blue reach the finals of ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023. Although India lost the match in the finals against Australia, the way Rohit led the team was praised by everyone. 

Before entering the Marquee event, Rohit and co. are coming after non-stop cricket in the 17th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) for more than 2 months, where the Indian players have performed brilliantly from their respective teams, which is helping them to adapt in the shortest format of the game in the ongoing ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2024.

Looking at the current form of the Indian team and standings in the group, the Men in Blue have almost qualified for the Super 8 after winning their 2 back-to-back games against Ireland and Pakistan, making them sit on the top of the Points table with 4 points having a positive net run rate of 1.455 in 2 games. However, the co-hosts, USA, also got the same number of points, but due to the low run rate, they have been sitting in the number 2 position. It will be really interesting to see which team will emerge victorious in between this team as they will clash against each other in their next game at the same venue.

Talking about the start, the 2007 Title winners got in the tournament is absolutely astounding, first showing their dominance as one of the top teams by defeating Bangladesh in the Warm-up game by 60 runs and then stopping Ireland on the score of 96 runs in 20 overs in their opening game of the Main event, it’s not less than a major boost for India to go forward in the tournament. However, India hasn’t scored big totals till now in the tournament. But the contribution made by the Indian batsman has been impressive so far where in the first game, Captain Rohit Sharma scored fifty in the opening game, leading the Indian team from the front. Meanwhile, in the second game against the arch-rivals, when Men in Blue were 2 wickets down on the score of 19 runs, the wicket-keeper batsman who is making his return to the Indian team after 2022 scored not only handled the pressure but also played a pivotal knock of 42 runs in 32 balls, which helped the Indian team to post a defendable total of 119 runs in 20 overs.

Later, the Indian bowlers showed their magic again by defending the total by 6 runs thanks to Jasprit Bumrah, who has picked the most wickets in IPL from Mumbai Indian franchise. Bumrah first picked the crucial wickets of Babar Azam, who was looking dangerous on the score of 13 runs and then the much-needed wicket of Md. Rizwan, on the score of 31 runs when they were required just 40 runs to win the match, which helped the Indian team to put pressure on the opposition. However, it was not just Bumrah, who performed well apart from him India’s all-rounder, Hardik Pandya, who has been criticised a lot by Indian fans for his form in the concluded Indian Premier League, proved his match-winning ability on the big stage by picking 2 wickets of Pakistan’s middle Fakhar Zaman (13) and Shadab Khan (4) in his 4 overs of spell.

Although, after this win India have almost qualified for Super 8 stage but they are going to play against United States of America, who  have defeated the top teams like Pakistan,  and Bangladesh in the shortest format of the game. USA cricket team are playing for the first time in the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup and the first season only they have got 2 wins in 2 games making them sit in the number 2 position in group A, along with the Indian team in the top position.

Let’s look at the squad of the Indian team

Rohit Sharma (c), Hardik Pandya, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Sanju Samson, Shivam Dube, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Arshdeep Singh, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj

India will be playing their next 2 group games against the USA and Canada on June 12th and June 15th at New York Cricket Stadium and Central Broward Regional Park Stadium Turf Ground, Lauderhill, respectively.