On Saturday, India and Bangladesh will square off in a practice match at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium. This is the only practice match for India before the T20 World Cup.
In their lone warm-up game before the T20 World Cup, Team India will play Bangladesh at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium, and skipper Rohit Sharma says the team will be seeking to get used to the new environment as soon as possible. On June 5, India will begin their campaign against Ireland.
“We’re looking to understand the conditions more importantly (before the tournament proper) as we haven’t been here before,” Rohit told ICC. “We will try and make the most of the conditions, get used to what it’s going to be like on June 5 when we play our first game.”
“It’s just about getting into that rhythm of getting the feel of the ground, pitch and stuff like that,” he said.
Before the World Cup, Team India, captained by Rohit, began their rigorous preparation by hitting the nets.
About the recently built stadium in New York, the Indian captain remarked, "It looks beautiful. It’s quite an open ground. When we come here and play our first game, I just can’t wait to feel the atmosphere in the stadium," he remarked.
“It’s a decent capacity as well. Hopefully, it’s gonna be a good one.” Rohit hoped that fans would throng the venue for their matches. People in New York will be very interested in coming and watching the World Cup, as it is happening for the first time here. I’m pretty sure all the fans across various teams are quite excited and looking forward to this tournament. And also as players (we) can’t wait to get started,” he noted.
Bangladesh captain Najmul Hossain Shanto was astounded to see the stadium in person after only being able to view images and different time lapses throughout the build-up.
“It’s unbelievable. I think it’s crazy,” Shanto said.
“I mean we all saw on the internet there was nothing (three months ago). Now it looks like a proper stadium and feels great. The Eastern grandstand (in particular), I didn’t expect it to be like this. I think it’s almost a proper stadium. The ground itself looks very good. It’s a proper cricket ground. To be very honest I wasn’t expecting anything like this but we all followed on social media how the wicket looks like, and how the ground would be, and we are very excited as to what is going to happen here. It feels very good and looks crazy to me.”