Dubai, Sep 10 (IANS) India have included Sanju Samson and Kuldeep Yadav in their playing eleven as captain Suryakumar Yadav won the toss and elected to bowl first against UAE in the Men’s T20 Asia Cup Group A game at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium on Wednesday.

Samson had been in contention with the returning Shubman Gill for the other opening slot, and the wicketkeeper-batter has been slotted at number five in the team sheet – a role where he hasn’t played much for India in T20Is and got the nod ahead of Jitesh Sharma.

India have also picked Kuldeep ahead of the likes of Arshdeep Singh and Harshit Rana, with an eye to exploit the spin-favouring conditions in Dubai, with Jasprit Bumrah, Shivam Dube and Hardik Pandya to handle fast-bowling duties. “Looks a nice fresh wicket. Humid also today, might be dew later. If we get an opportunity, we’re flexible to do anything but today we want to bowl.”

“If we get an opportunity, we’re flexible to do anything but today we want to bowl. We came here early, had 3-4 good practice sessions and also a day off,” said Suryakumar, who’s leading India in a multi-nation tournament for the first time and is coming off after recovering from a hernia surgery in July.

UAE were winners of the ACC Premier Cup last year, which paved their way to play in the Asia Cup. “We were also looking to bowl. Pitch is fresh and maybe the ball will do something early. We had a good series, took many positive points and we’re confident from that series. We’re going with a good combination with spinners and fast bowlers, and juniors and seniors,” said UAE skipper Muhammad Waseem.

In the pitch report, Russel Arnold and Sanjay Manjrekar reckoned the conditions should remain the same throughout, with the square boundaries standing at 62m and 75m respectively. They also felt the pitch, with 4mm grass, could be slightly two-paced and unpredictable.

Playing XIs

India: Shubman Gill (vice-captain), Abhishek Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav (captain), Tilak Varma, Sanju Samson, Shivam Dube, Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Varun Chakaravarthy and Jasprit Bumrah

UAE: Muhammad Waseem (captain), Muhammad Zohaib, Asif Khan, Alishan Sharafu, Rahul Chopra, Dhruv Parashar, Haider Ali, Muhammad Rohid, Harshit Kaushik, Junaid Siddique and Simranjeet Singh

–IANS

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