India picked up a convincing victory over England in the first T20I of the series at Eden Gardens in Kolkata. Pacer Arshdeep Singh wreaked havoc in the powerplay, picking up two wickets while Varun Chakravarthy weaved his magic in the middle overs, clinching three. Young India opener Abhishek Sharma played a destructive innings of 79 runs off 34 deliveries as the hosts won the match by seven wickets.
Chennai’s MA Chidambaram Stadium will host the second T20I of the series on January 25. Ahead of flying to the city, young India batter Tilak Varma expressed his desire to eat dosa in the morning at Varun’s house and dinner at Washington Sundar’s place. The Hyderabad-born cricketer was also asked about Chennai and to which, the 22-year-old mentioned that the city reminds him of the legendary cricketer MS Dhoni.
“Chennai bole toh pehela chiz Mahi bhai aata hai mind mai. Uske baad hi sab kuch aata hai. Mahi bhai aur Rajnikant sir aate hai. Yeh bol sakta hoon ki ‘Mai thalaiva’ (MS Dhoni comes to my mind whenever I hear Chennai. The rest of the things follow. Dhoni and Rajnikant sir’s name comes to my mind. All I can say, ‘I am thalaiva’,” Tilak said in a video released by BCCI.
“There are two players from Chennai in our team. One of them is Varun and the other one is Washington Sundar. All I want to tell them is that, ‘Varun, I want a crispy dosa for breakfast in the morning and in the evening, I want dinner at Washington’s place,” Tilak added.
Meanwhile, the surface at MA Chidambaram Stadium traditionally favours the spinners and it is very likely that the Suryakumar Yadav-led side will play an unchanged XI. In that case, star pacer Mohammed Shami will once again have to sit out.