Mumbai, March 5 England won the toss and chose to field first against India in the second semi-final of the 2026 ICC Men's T20 World Cup at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Thursday. Both teams are competing for a spot in the final against New Zealand.
England made one change to their playing XI, bringing in Jamie Overton for Rehan Ahmed, while India retained the same team that had won against the West Indies in their last Super 8 match.
England captain Harry Brook said that the pitch looks good for chasing. "It looks like a good pitch, we hope to get a good start and then chase it down. India has more experience, we will try to assess the conditions and play to the best of our ability. T20 cricket is unpredictable. We have played well and managed to get through, and that will serve us well," he said at the toss.
India captain Suryakumar Yadav said that they would have batted first anyway. "We would have batted first. There is no wind, so I don't think there will be dew. The atmosphere in the camp is positive. We have tightened things up; our brand of cricket has been different. The best pitch, credit to the curator and groundsman," he said.
Suryakumar has a reason for considering batting first because he believes that dew will not play a significant role in the match. To counter the possibility of dew later in the evening, an anti-dew repellent has been applied to the ground, which should help maintain a fair balance between the two teams.
Playing XI:
India: Abhishek Sharma, Sanju Samson (wk), Ishan Kishan, Suryakumar Yadav (capt), Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Varun Chakravarthy, Jasprit Bumrah
England: Phil Salt, Jos Buttler (wk), Jacob Bethell, Harry Brook (capt), Tom Banton, Sam Curran, Will Jacks, Jamie Overton, Liam Dawson, Jofra Archer, Adil Rashid.
