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While the spotlight turns onto the first of eight white-ball matches between Australia and India, local eyes are also looking further into the future and the Ashes series that begins in just over a month back in Perth.
Pat Cummins is all but ruled out of opener against England but Australia’s chair of selectors, George Bailey, is optimistic about the captain’s chances of playing a significant part in the the Test series.
[We are] really confident that he’s going to play a major part. Hopefully it’s the first Test. If not, then we’ll pick it up.
India XI
Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill (capt), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (wk), Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Nitish Reddy, Harshit Rana, Arshdeep Singh, Mohammed Siraj.
A mix of the old and new for the tourists with Rohit and Kohli in the side while Nitish Reddy makes his ODI debut.
Australia XI
Travis Head, Mitchell Marsh (capt), Matt Short, Josh Philippe (wk), Matt Renshaw, Mitch Owen, Cooper Connolly, Mitchell Starc, Nathan Ellis, Matt Kuhnemann, Josh Hazlewood.
A pair of ODI debutants for Australia also mean cap presentations are in order. Shaun Marsh hands Matt Renshaw his cap, Tim David does the honours for Mitch Owen.
Marnus Labuschagne will bide his time after finding red-hot form in domestic matches and being a late addition to the squad.
Shubman Gill concedes that India would have bowled first if they had won the toss and believes his side is ready to play despite only arriving in Australia three days ago.
Looking at the weather, it might be a stop-and-play game. It looks like a good surface so hopefully we get some runs on the board.
It’s all about getting mentally ready. Most of the players were playing in India before coming here, so it’s just about getting together. I think we’re in a good mental space.
Toss
Mitch Marsh is leading Australia in the white-ball series against India’s Shubman Gill. The Australia skipper wins the toss and elects to field first in the ODI at Optus Stadium.
Marsh explains his thinking as he captains the national side at his home ground…
Looks like a pretty good Perth Stadium wicket, hopefully it’s hard and fast, little bit of moisture around, hopefully we can make the most of that today.
It’s always a huge honour to captain your country but I guess to do it front a somewhat home crowd is always an exciting day.
Preamble
Hello and welcome to live coverage of the first one-day international between Australia and India at Optus Stadium in Perth. This is the opener of three ODIs between the arch-rivals with the remainder of the series to be played in Adelaide on Thursday and Sydney on Saturday. A five-match T20 series will follow that before the main event on these shores when England arrive for the Ashes next month.
But before we reach the highly-anticipated Test series, there is fresh appetite for white-ball matches especially with India in town and a near-sell out is expected today in Perth.
There has been a bit of rain and cloud around this morning with more showers forecast to arrive later in the day, but the covers are off at the moment so the players are on track to start at the scheduled time.
First ball will be at 11:30 local time in Perth / 2.30pm AEDT / 9am IST. The toss and team news will be coming up shortly. Meanwhile, let us know your thoughts and predictions - shoot me an email or find me @martinpegan on Bluesky or X. Let’s get into it!
