WTC final: Aakash Chopra dissects Australia’s playing XI for summit clash

Aakash Chopra and Australia Team. (Photo Source: Twitter)

Cricketer-turned-broadcaster Aakash Chopra is of the opinion that Australia’s veteran opener David Warner’s presence in Australia’s playing XI can act as a chink in their armour as far as the World Test Championship final is concerned.

The stage is set for both the World Test Championship finalists to collide at The Oval in a bid to earn Test cricket’s ultimate crown. The Pat Cummins-led side will take on the Rohit Sharma-led India on June 7 and it will go on till June 11. If a substantial amount of time is lost during the course of the first five days without a result then the reserve day (June 12) will come into play.

Warner’s numbers during Australia’s recent tour of India for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy were pretty average. Having only managed to score 26 runs across three innings before getting ruled out of the series due to an elbow injury, Warner had a torrid Test outing.

Aakash Chopra took to his YouTube channel to preview the WTC final at The Oval and touched upon Warner’s underwhelming record in Tests on English soil.

“What will the opposition team be like? I am seeing David Warner as slightly 50-50 there. His numbers in England are also very bad. Usman Khawaja and then you are looking at Marnus Labuschagne, Steven Smith and Travis Head.”

Chopra also acknowledged that Australia have a pretty robust batting order and a very potent bowling attack to go with it.

“After that, Alex Carey and then Cameron Green, or the other way around. So you will see a lot of depth in batting. Then you will see Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc – again they bat well in these conditions, and Scott Boland is in decent form.”

Australia will be going in with Scott Boland instead of Michael Neser for the final as skipper Pat Cummins confirmed the same. Nathan Lyon will most likely take care of the spin department for the first-time finalists.