2017 ICC Champions Trophy: Unchanged South Africa Bat First; Fakhar Zaman, Junaid Khan In For Pakistan

Nov 2, 2023 at 3:46 PM

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2017 ICC Champions Trophy: Unchanged South Africa Bat First; Fakhar Zaman, Junaid Khan In For Pakistan

South Africa won the toss and decided to bat first in their second league stage game against Pakistan at Birmingham, where the rain could again have its say.

The Proteas skipper was reluctant to make any change in the winning combination and did not tinker with the side. Despite the pitch not being expected to spin even in the second innings, AB de Villiers was happy to keep Imran Tahir in the side, who was the Man of the match in the previous game.

Pakistan made a total of two changes in the side, one of being the forced one, as Junaid Khan’s inclusion was an obvious once because of an injury to Wahab Riaz. Fakhar Zaman was the second player, who replaced an underperforming Ahmed Shehzad. Zaman might open the innings alongside Azhar Ali.

This is a must win the game for Pakistan, as if they suffer a loss here, then this will be the end of the road for them in this year’s Champions Trophy, whereas, it’s an opportunity for South Africa to win the game and qualify for the semi-final stage.

This game will be a real test for Pakistan, as it has always been seen that they fumble when asked to chase down a total. This game will tell whether they are a contender to win the cup or not.

Here is the playing XI of both the teams –

Pakistan Playing XI: Azhar Ali, Fakhar Zaman, Babar Azam, Mohammad Hafeez, Shoaib Malik, Sarfraz Ahmed(w/c), Imad Wasim, Shadab Khan, Mohammad Amir, Junaid Khan, Hasan Ali

South Africa Playing XI: Hashim Amla, Quinton de Kock(w), Faf du Plessis, AB de Villiers(c), David Miller, Jean-Paul Duminy, Chris Morris, Wayne Parnell, Kagiso Rabada, Morne Morkel, Imran Tahir

Here is what both the captains said at the time of the toss –

Sarfraz Ahmed: We would have liked to bat first, but it’s not in our hands. Two changes – Shehzad and Riaz not playing. Fakhar and Junaid in. Had a good meeting yesterday, the morale is pretty high. Hope we do well.

AB de Villiers: We are going to have a bat first. We batted well in the last game. Wicket has been worn out a few times, a couple of games have been played on this wicket. Don’t think it’s going to take a lot of turn, but might become slower and break up a bit. We had good intensity for 80% of the game against Sri Lanka, so we’d like to raise that to 100%. No changes today.

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