🏏Asia Cup 2023: Pakistan vs Nepal at Multan at 3 PM IST on 30/08/23🏏 - Page 3

For opponents Nepal, their maiden qualification to the Asia Cup in itself represents a massive triumph. They gained ODI status only in 2018, and since then their rise in this format has been meteoric. They boast of series wins over USA and Netherlands, and more recently they beat UAE to book their spot for the Asia Cup in the ACC Premier Cup Final. Cricket has piqued the fancy of a whole country out there, and this Asia Cup is a chance for their young side to rub shoulders with some of the best in the world. It’ll need a colossal upset for Nepal to make it out of the group, but getting to here and having such an experience would be a big feather in their cap nevertheless. A dry, warm afternoon in Multan awaits us, stick around...

Pitch Report: When you come to Multan, you realise the pitches are heavily titled towards the batter. It is nicely rolled, hard and dry, Ball will come onto the bat nicely. For the spinners, it might turn a bit but they have to make the most by adjusting their bounce. It might swing a bit under lights, but overall looks like a really good batting surface, says Aamer Sohail and Deep Dasgupta.

Pitch: Aamir Sohail says the Multan pitches are heavily tilted towards the batters and it's no different today. It's nicely rolled, bone dry, and it's hard. Batters should be able to express themselves. Spinners might get turn but it has to be accentuated by the bounce. Ball might swing under lights for the faster bowlers but will remain a good track, the pace and bounce will be consistent, don't think it'll slow down

Pitch Report: When you come to Multan, you realise the pitches are heavily titled towards the batter. It is nicely rolled, hard and dry, Ball will come onto the bat nicely. For the spinners, it might turn a bit but they have to make the most by adjusting their bounce. It might swing a bit under lights, but overall looks like a really good batting surface, says Aamer Sohail and Deep Dasgupta.

Pak won toss and will bat first!

Babar says it's a dry, shiny wicket. So, they'll bat first. Says there are confident with their team, so they announced their XI yesterday.

Thank you Raji, for the thread and for tagging me.

The result is a known one, but let us see how the Nepal team will play.

Rohit Paudel: Everyone is very happy, it is our first game in the Asia Cup. Everyone in Nepal is really excited for this game. Most of the things are very similar to Nepal, looks like a beautiful wicket to bat on.

Pakistan have won the toss and have opted to bat

Babar Azam: We will bat first, pitch looks very dry and shiny. No reason to name the XI earlier, we wanted to give confidence to our team. To be honest, being top ranked team brings good pressure, we'll try to enjoy and do our best.