India bowling coach Avishkar Salvi emphasised that team's primary focus will be to play cricket ahead of their clash against arch-rivals Pakistan in the Women's World Cup on October 5. He further stated that they want to take the upcoming match as just another game and don't want to think too much about it.
“The area of focus will be cricket. We want our girls to bring their A game on the day. We want them to take it just as a game because the World Cup is a long campaign," Salvi said at the pre-match press-conference.
“We have been telling the team to work on their strategies and plans, be clear with whatever you want to achieve, both as a group and individually. There is a lot of information available, footages and patterns on how a team is playing. You can derive plans out of it. We take every game on its merit and prepare with the best possible mindset," he added.
What is India's head-to-head vs Pakistan in WODIs?
The India-Pakistan matches have been quite a one-sided affair especially when it comes to ODIs as the Women in Blue hold an unbelievable record of 11-0. They will be hoping to make it their 12th consecutive ODI win over their rivals on Sunday. The match is set to take place at the R. Premadasa stadium in Colombo.
Both the teams have had vastly different starts to their respective World Cup campaigns. While India began their tournament on a high and crushed Sri Lanka by 59 runs in their opener, Pakistan were handed a reality check by Bangladesh, who defeated them comprehensively by seven wickets. It was nothing short of a horrific start for the Fatima Sana-led side as they got bundled out for just 129 runs and weren't able to impress with their bowling either as Bangladesh chased down the modest target in 31.1 overs.
How does the points table look?
While India currently sit at the fourth place on the points table, Pakistan are sixth with an abysmal net run-rate of -1.623. It is safe to say that the latter will have to improve both their batting and bowling departments drastically in order to defeat the Women in Blue in their World Cup clash.