‘Advantage India in ICC Champions Trophy final vs Pakistan’

The stage is set for the final and it doesn’t get any bigger than India taking on Pakistan. I feel India is too experienced a side for Pakistan and we should come out winners at the end of it all.

The fact that we’ve had a host of players click in the run up to this final will be our biggest advantage. The number of match-winners in this side is something that will give Virat Kohli and his men the utmost confidence on Sunday. Pakistan don’t match up if you’re making a comparison to India. In all departments, be it talent or experience, we are ahead by some distance.

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India also has a great head-to-head record against Pakistan in ICC tournaments, so that will surely play on everyone’s mind. India’s team is young, confident and will be raring to go on Sunday at The Oval and Pakistan will have to put in one hell of a shift against them.

I wish both the sides the best, but I just feel India will have too much in their tank for our arch rivals.

I think Rohit Sharma and Kohli have hit form at just the right time for India. You want to go into a final in the best form possible, feeling confident. It’s the same with our bowlers. Jasprit Bumrah has been very consistent with his performances for the team.

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In the semi-final, India got things spot on, right from the toss itself. Everything worked in our favour. Rohit and Shikhar Dhawan gave us just the start we needed. You can trust Kohli to steer the ship to shore safely. All of them have been in great touch and I feel really good for Sunday’s game. Credit to our bowlers as well in restricting them to less than 300 runs

It’s important to get those breakthroughs and Kedar Jadhav did exactly that with the crucial wickets of Tamim Iqbal and Mushfiqur Rahim respectively. We were always in the game, but this applied the brakes to their innings.

Bangladesh should be really proud of itsef for getting this far in the tournament. Despite the rain playing spoilsport for Australia, it finished second in a group that had hosts England as well as New Zealand.

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Bangladesh’s win against New Zealand was unexpected which is what made us love the result even more. They just got beaten by the better side in the semi-final. It’s good to see them improving with every passing tournament and giving the big guns a run for their money.

Bangladesh might just turn out to be a force to reckon with in future tournaments. You never know.