These are still early days of the Champions Trophy, but the prefix ‘neutral venue’ before Dubai for India’s matches is already inviting chuckles. In a tournament hosted by Pakistan, it is India — thanks to the conditions in Dubai — which is feeling more at home, with teams in Group B already sweating at the prospect of playing their semi-finals here on March 4. It’s somewhat akin to suddenly land up in Chennai to play on carefully-curated sluggish tracks that abet Chennai Super Kings. What’s more, here India don’t have any ‘away’ game.
With the match between Australia and South Africa washed out at Rawalpindi on Tuesday, the Group B is now wide open with Wednesday’s fixture between England and Afghanistan at Lahore being a knockout clash. Once that happens, the calculators would be out of the pockets as the winner of that match will have to win the next match to make it to the semi-finals. Out of the two fixtures on Friday (Australia vs Afghanistan) and Saturday (South Africa vs England) one is certain to be a virtual quarterfinals. Adding to the intrigue is until Saturday’s clash is over none of them will know who has to take the flight to Dubai and face India and who will face New Zealand in second semi-finals at Lahore on March 5.
This of course isn’t a complexity that has been suddenly airdropped. When the ICC adopted a hybrid model for the Champions Trophy, there were noises around the unfair advantage India were going to gain by the virtue of playing all their matches in Dubai. While other teams have had to shuttle between at least two of the three venues in Pakistan – Karachi, Rawalpindi and Lahore, whoever was lined up to face India had to take the flight to Dubai and head back again.
More than the logistical challenge, it is the conditions that one has got to witness in Dubai that is again adding more noise with regards to how India, despite playing in a neutral venue, are after all being a home team. And these noises are not without reasons as well as unlike India, which knew what sort of conditions to expect in Dubai, packed their squad with five spinners, where as the remaining seven teams, while factoring the flat decks in Pakistan have had to rely on pacers as well. If the Dubai pitches played similarly as Pakistan’s, then there wouldn’t be any hue and cry, but they have been markedly different.
That India, so far, have looked the best side in the tournament and with conditions aiding them, the favourites tag has already been added as prefix. “What about the advantage India have in playing only in Dubai? Which seems to me to be a hard-to-quantify advantage, but an undeniable advantage,” former England captain Michael Atherton told Nasser Hussain on Sky Sports Podcast.
“They’re playing at just one venue. Therefore, the selection, you know, can focus in on the conditions in Dubai. And obviously, they’ll know where they’re playing their semi-final as and when they get through to that. That seems to me to be an undeniable advantage, but, you know, kind of hard to quantify how big an advantage,” he said.
It is hard to deny that India indeed have an advantage here. So far in the two matches, dew has been non-existent. So despite batting second on conditions that only get slower through the night, India have managed to post comfortable wins. And whosoever travels to Dubai for the semi-finals will have just one day to assess the conditions and rework their strategy that would be totally different to what they have adapted in Pakistan.
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In the two matches in Dubai, 241/4 has been the highest total when batting first. Because of the slightly warm conditions in the afternoon, India’s three spinners – Axar Patel, Ravindra Jadeja and Kuldeep Yadav – have made the ball to grip and turn. In the middle-overs, a phase where most teams are used to go on the offensive against spinners because there are only four fielders outside the ring, they may have to find batsmen who could manoeuvre through the gaps. Similarly while operating with the ball, the likes of England, Australia and South Africa have preferred operating with X-factor pacers from one end as against making it easy with spinners because of the field restrictions. Over here, they have to move away from that template even if it is just one game.
It is these elements that are already making the likes of Australia and England feel threatened by the conditions before they board the flight to Dubai. South Africa, to an extent, will be no different, but between the three teams, they seem better equipped to face the conditions here. Among the teams in fray, two teams could pose India plenty of challenges here in Dubai.
For instance, New Zealand, which has a well-balanced team like India with a good mix of spinners and seamers, will enjoy the luxury of getting to know the conditions in Dubai before the knockouts begin. Scheduled to play India in the final group game on Sunday, they will then head back to Lahore for the semi-finals. And in case, should the Black Caps return here, it will make for an even contest as because of the number of left-handed batsmen that Kiwis have in their ranks, India may not be able to play their three left-arm spinners and may have to bring in either Washington Sundar or Varun Chakaravarthy.
Similarly, from an India team point of view, they might feel playing Afghanistan here could pose a bigger threat, because with a rounded spin attack and due to their familiarity with the conditions, will definitely push them to their limits. In 2018, Afghanistan had even tied a game against India here.
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But it shouldn’t be all doom. These slow, turning conditions haven’t been completely to India’s liking as well. After all, going extreme with those conditions at Ahmedabad is what made them miss out on winning a World Cup on home soil. And six months ago, they were whitewashed by Sri Lanka in similar conditions. So it is not as if India is invincible in these conditions. The question is how prepared the others are to indulge in a slugfest.
