Australia and India played out an entertaining opening ODI in their series in Perth on Tuesday which has watered the mouth ahead of the second match which takes place in Brisbane on Friday.
Australia won that opening ODI in pretty convincing fashion. If they were to win this match then they will go 2-0 up in the series with only three matches to play which would be a dominant position. India will be looking to level the series to set up three excellent matches to come.
Australia pulled India back well in Perth and then were almost dismissive at times with the bat. Their run chase was built around the wonderful partnership between Steve Smith and George Bailey and it will give the Aussies confidence that some big players didn’t contribute too much as they have plenty left to come.
The home side will be without David Warner in this match. He has been released from the squad on parental leave so Shaun Marsh will come into the side. He’s in excellent form so that isn’t much of a downgrade. Mitch Marsh is sitting this game out. Kane Richardson or John Hastings will replace him.
India were going along really nicely halfway through their innings but they lost their way in the second part with the bat and never really regained control back even though they were able to bag a couple of early wickets. Their lack of bowling mite could be a concern for them going forward in this series.
It looks like India are going to make a change to their bowling attack with an extra seamer, most probably Ishant Sharma, coming into the side. Ravi Ashwin could be the one most likely to make way but Ravindra Jadeja could also be rested.
The Brisbane Cricket Ground is the venue for this second match in the series. There have been 75 previous matches on this ground with Australia playing in 39 of them. They have won 21 of those matches and lost 14 with four no results. India have a 4-9 record on this ground.
Anyone who has watched the Big Bash in recent weeks will know this is one of the best one day wickets not only in Australia but in the world these days and with two indifferent bowling attacks on show we should be seeing plenty more runs here. Scores of 300+ are fairly commonplace here.
I took Australia to win the first match and while I would expect their batting depth to shine again here I’m not taking them this time because defending this ground is so hard so if they are shoved into bat first they will be severely disadvantaged.
We saw a high scoring match in the first game and as long as the forecasted rain slides down the side of the ground I’m expecting another run fest here too. The outfield here is quick and the boundaries are all accessible especially straight so I fancy plenty of boundaries here especially with the current fielding restrictions.
Both sides have plenty of depth with the bat and neither bowling attack look too threatening so I’m happy to take over 56.5 boundaries here with this match having the potential to have a lot more of them than the 59 we saw in Perth.
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