India vs England T20 World Cup 2026 Match Playing 11: Team India face a couple of questions about their playing XI for the semi-final against England on Thursday. For starters, should India keep the faith with opener Abhishek Sharma? The man who came into the tournament with a reputation of being the destroyer-in-chief for the Men in Blue has managed to score just 80 runs in six matches at an average of 13.33. Of those 80, 55 runs came in just a single innings. His strike rate of 131.14 has also not been at his usual best. , and Ishan Kishan capable of slotting into the opener’s slot with Sanju Samson, there will be a slight temptation to drop Abhishek.
But one glance at the scorecard of the last time Abhishek played at ’s Wankhede Stadium will make a strong case for India to retain the southpaw: he had smashed a 54-ball 135 at a strike rate of 250.
Ravi Shastri and Ricky Ponting, speaking in The ICC Review, made a case for Gautam Gambhir and to keep Abhishek in the XI.
“Unless the team management realises that, mentally Abhishek is not there (they should continue with him). If mentally, his mindset has taken a beating, it’s for them to judge from the outside, in conversations with him, just seeing the way he’s batting in the nets,” the former India head coach said. “I won’t take that (his past scores) away at the Wankhede. He’s done well in the past. He’s got some big hundreds there and very quick hundreds. I’ll persist with him because there’s enough firepower in that batting.”
Ponting added that while Abhishek had not lived up to the pre-tournament expectations he had off the Indian, he would still keep the faith.
“Abhishek has obviously not made the runs that any of us expected. I had him down as the leading run scorer and possibly the player of the tournament going back about a month ago. That hasn’t happened yet, but I would agree with Ravi. I would stick with him,” Ponting said.
India probable XI: , Sanju Samson (wk), Ishan Kishan, Suryakumar Yadav (c), Tilak Varma, , , , , , Varun Chakravarthy.
England probable XI: Phil Salt, Jos Buttler (wk), Jacob Bethell, Tom Banton, Harry Brook (c), Sam Curran, Will Jacks, Liam Dawson, Jamie Overton, Jofra Archer, Adil Rashid.
