Georgetown (Guyana), June 27 (IANS): The toss in the second semi-final of the 2024 Men’s T20 World Cup between India and England has been officially delayed due to rain at the Providence Stadium on Thursday.
In the run-up to the highly anticipated clash, which is a re-match of the Men’s T20 World Cup 2022 semifinal in Adelaide, weather forecasts always hinted at the constant threat of rain disrupting the proceedings.
On Thursday morning, various reports emerged of rain in Georgetown three hours before the scheduled toss time, which eventually stopped in time for the ground to dry up.
But at 6:50 pm India time, rain returned at the venue, with dark clouds looming around. It meant the ground staff put the covers on the pitch plus playing square quickly. As soon as the rain got heavier, both teams had to abandon their warm-ups and move towards their respective dressing rooms.
Though the rain stopped 20 minutes before the toss happened, it wasn’t enough to get the coin toss done as per the scheduled time. Unlike the first semi-final in Trinidad, which South Africa won by nine wickets, there is no reserve day for the second semi-final in Guyana.
It means that the winner of the second semi-final must be decided on the match day, with an extra 250 minutes allocated to complete the match. If the minimum of ten overs a side contest can't be played due to inclement weather, India will qualify for Saturday's title clash in Barbados as a result of finishing at the top of Group 1 in the Super Eight stage and would lead to defending champions England being knocked out of the competition.
Squads:
India: Rohit Sharma (c), Hardik Pandya, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant (wk), Sanju Samson (wk), Shivam Dube, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Arshdeep Singh, Jasprit Bumrah, and Mohammed Siraj.
England: Jos Buttler (c & wk), Moeen Ali, Jofra Archer, Jonathan Bairstow, Harry Brook, Sam Curran, Ben Duckett, Tom Hartley, Will Jacks, Chris Jordan, Liam Livingstone, Adil Rashid, Phil Salt, Reece Topley and Mark Wood