India vs Pakistan T20 World Cup: Melbourne Pitch Report, Team India's Record at MCG

IND vs Pakistan T20 World Cup: The Indian men are set to commence the much-awaited T20 World Cup 2022 campaign in Australia. The side will be playing Pakistan in the tournament opener, on Sunday, October 23. The match will be played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) at 1:30 PM (IST).

India vs Pakistan Pitch Report

It’s a balanced pitch at the MCG to say, but is better suited for pacers, as most of the Australian pitches do. The pitch offers much bounce to the ball, and the ball too carries well here. The ball may swing a little too many bits anyway. Spinners, on the other hand, won’t have much to do.

The weather here during October varies between 9 to 19° Celcius with the breeze and the cameo of rain a vital thing overall.

Based on the last five T20 games played at the MCG, the average first innings score has been around 148, and the average total score varied around 149. 80% of the toss-winning captains opted for bowling first and almost all the teams won the game, while bowling first.

Team India’s Record at MCG

Until now, 15 T20Is were played here, and among those India have featured in four. The ‘Men in Blue’ have won two and have lost one game out of them.

	Match	Result	Year
1	India vs Australia	Australia won by 9 wickets	2008
2	India vs Australia	India won by 8 wickets	2012
3	India vs Australia	India won by 27 runs	2016
4	India vs Australia	No Result	2018

Pakistan too, have played one game at the MCG and have lost that. In fact, they haven’t won any T20I game in Australia.

The Rivals to Meet, Again!

India recently played a couple of practice games and a warm-up game. They managed to win one of the two practice games against Western Australia XI in Perth. While, they also dominated in the only warm-up game against the hosts, Australia, in Brisbane. India won that game by six runs. The side was also supposed to play the second warm-up game against New Zealand. However, the rain didn’t allow the sides to lock their horns.

Pakistan men, on the other hand, played two warm-up matches. One against England and the other against Afghanistan. They lost to England by six wickets, while couldn’t complete their batting against Afghanistan due to rain.

As both sides are set to fire up, here’s the pitch report for the blockbuster clash.

The India-Pakistan rivalry is one of the biggest in the sports world. The cricket’s El-Clasico this time is set to be played in Australia, with a long run to attain ahead.

This is the third meeting of the sides in 2022 and the previous two were in the Asia Cup 2022. India won a league-stage game there, while Pakistan won a ‘Super 4’ stage game. In the last T20 World Cup in UAE, Pakistan defeated India historically.

Besides, India are placed in Group 2, along with Bangladesh, Netherlands, Pakistan, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. After the Pakistan match, India will play the Netherlands on Thursday (October 27) at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG).