Zimbabwe has matured a lot in the limited over game and could bring down any side on their day. Their performances at Sharjah have been quite remarkable considering the fact that they have been playing under tremendous pressure. Their batting has looked solid and the bowling has always been threatening. But more importantly their fielders have stuck to their task and have earned a reputation of being one of the best fielding sides in the world.
However India would still go in as the favourites simply because of their excellent run of success in the limited over game. In addition they have a marvellous record at Sharjah and will be hoping to clinch their sixth major title at this favourite venue. Their batting has tremendous depth and the entire top order has been among the runs. But they will be depending more on Sachin Tendulkar who cracked a superb century in their first game against Zimbabwe.
But the Zimbabwe bowling attack looks quite penetrative and they would have a psychological advantage having dismissed the Indian opener cheaply in their final league game. India will be hoping that Tendulkar would rise to the occasion as he has done in the past. Ajay Jadeja too is in good form and along with skipper Azharuddin, Ganguly and Robin Singh they could form a formidable combination with a great amount of experience behind them.
The Indian bowling has been quite impressive in this tournament and the two medium pacemen Ajith Agarkar and Javagal Srinath have always been successful during their opening spells. Agarkar in fact has turned out to be a real match winner and seem to have improved a lot in the past. The spinners Kumble, Joshi and Chopra have certainly added variety into their attack and several batsmen have struggled to get runs from them.
Zimbabwe skipper Alistair Campbell said that he is confident of winning the tournament and will be hoping for a score of over 250 runs if they batted first. The wicket is quite good but one need to stay there for some time and settle down before opening out, said the Zimbabwe captain. He was full of praise on the performance of Henry Olanga who won the man of the match award in the last game against India.
The Indian captain Mohammed Azharuddin said that his side would bounce back despite losing their last preliminary round game on Wednesday. The Indian team is determined to perform well and will be hoping for a good effort from their top order batsmen.
The champions will receive US dollars 40,000 while the runners up will receive US dollars 30,000. In addition the third placed team will receive US dollars 15,000. The man of the match will be presented US dollars 1500 and the man of the series will receive US dollars 2500.
The three beneficiaries of this tournament are Naren Tamhane, Roger Binny and Anshuman Gaekwad all from India.