India vs Zimbabwe 1st ODI 2010: Preview and Live Score

After the end of Twenty20 World Cup 2010, Zimbabwe and India are going to play their first one-day international game in the upcoming tri-nation ODI series in Zimbabwe. Host team, Zimbabwe, will take on India on May 28, 2010 in the first match of triangular series. This match will be played at Queens Sports Club in Bulawayo. It is scheduled to start at 07:00 GMT and 12:30 Indian Standard Time.

India:

Twenty-four-year-old player, Suresh Raina, will be seen leading Indian cricket team in this tour series. He has become the 20^th Indian captain and the first from Uttar Pradesh. It is going to be the most important match in his career as he will make his captaincy debut against Zimbabwe.

Suresh has not gained enough experience to lead any team. He has led the India A team in the past and his home state of Uttar Pradesh.

No doubt, it will not be an easy task for him as he will have to lead a young Indian squad. It will be interesting to see if he can successfully lead the team.

Before leaving India, he attended his first-ever pre-tour press conference in Mumbai. When he was asked if he had got any tips from regular captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni, he revealed that he was asked to keep things simple.

It will be interesting to see if Suresh Raina pays attention to his skipper’s advice when it comes to the action in Zimbabwe. India’s most experienced player, Sachin Tendulkar, told him to be humble. His humble attitude will help him to achieve everything.

Getting captaincy means extra responsibility. It will not be different for Suresh Raina. He takes it as a big challenge. He played under Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid and MS Dhoni, who are known as the best captains in the history of Indian cricket. Let’s see if he follows their foot steps and takes India to a better position.

MS Dhoni, who was called “Captain Cool” for his cool gesture during team’s serious situation, has been rested for tiredness. His fans will miss him a lot. However, it is expected that Dhoni will make his come back as soon as possible.

Bowling line up will be the main cause of concern for the Indian cricket team as there are no senior bowlers. Selectors rested some senior players from this short tour series.

To fill up the gap, selectors called some young and inexperienced bowlers. No doubt, it will be a challenging task for them, but at the same time, it will be interesting to see if they can support their team.

However, skipper, Suresh Raina, said that Zimbabwe tour will be a learning experience for the inexperienced bowlers. He also said that bowlers will get a chance to compete in the seamer-friendly tracks to secure their positions before the seniors’ return.

Suresh Raina will largely depend on Umesh Yadav, Vinay Kumar and Ashok Dinda as they have good form in domestic cricket. Their performance brought them in the main squad. Now, they will have to struggle hard to prove their quality and advance their career in the international cricket.

Vinay Kumar has been called as the replacement of injured Praveen kumar. He, along with Ashok Dinda, will play an important role for team India.

Zimbabwean venues are helpful for pace bowling so, Indian cricket team will have to use more pace bowlers to get the benefit of the pitch. However, Indian batsmen are not skilled in bounce and pace. Because of these two weaknesses they were eliminated from the Super Eight round in the ICC Twenty20 World Cup 2010 that took place in West Indies.

Despite India’s poor performance in the recently concluded T20 tournament, Suresh Raina is hopeful of a better performance. Now, they are going to play in the longer format of cricket game that has no similarity with the shortest version of cricket game.

Fans will be interested to see how Indian cricket team performs without some high profile players like MS Dhoni, Sachin Tendulkar and Zaheer Khan. Raina is considered as the only experienced player in Indian squad. He will have to perform under huge pressure. It might also affect his performance.

Zimbabwe:

Zimbabwe cricket team will also play under a new captain, Elton Chigumbura. Elton Chigumbura is looking forward to the series as an opportunity to improve their own game against two fielding weakened nations.

It is a great opportunity for his team to prove that they can play well against the top nations in international cricket. He will be looking to win as many games as possible and continue the form.

As Indian cricket team reached Zimbabwe without the majority of their senior players, host team will be looking forward to take advantage.

Indian cricket team has been drafted as the second favorite team following Sri Lanka in the tri-nation series.

However, host team Zimbabwe is no less powerful. They improved their performance day by day. In the T20 World Cup 2010 warm-up matches, they defeated two strong teams: Australia and Pakistan.

Another reason to give Zimbabwe the favorite tag is that Indian selectors have selected a second-string Indian team where nine senior players have not been included.

Despite India’s shocking performance in T20 world cup, stand-in captain, Suresh Raina, believes his young side will make big bounce back in the winning streak. This tour series can reduce India’s pain as they failed to get the trophy second time. Indian cricket team is the number one in Test ranking. They will try hard to take the number one position on ODI ranking as well.

It is also believed that India vs Zimbabwe 1^st tri-nation ODI series will be the much viewed game. Fans of both countries will be watching to see this game live on TV. Ten Sports will broadcast this match live in South Asian sub-continent including India, Bangladesh and Pakistan etc. Doordarshan will also broadcast this match live in India. Supersport has got the right to broadcast in Africa.

Here, I am giving some websites name where from you can get live score of this match:

Cricinfo

Cricketnext

action8cricket

sticksports

thatscricket

cricketworld

In the end, the India vs Zimbabwe is going to be one of the most exciting and nail biting ODI matches in the tri-nation series.