India enters the last leg of its tour of South Africa — the three-match T20I seres — with its confidence sky high and with a great opportunity to secure another limited-overs series win. The home team has three new faces but with enough experience in the squad to redeem itself, be more competitive and potentially win the T20I series on the back of a crushing one-day series defeat.
Ahead of Sunday's opening Twenty20 International at the Wanderers Stadium, here's Sportstar 's statistical preview.
Another day, another landmark beckons Kohli
What separates Virat Kohli from his contemporaries is his consistency across formats; he is devastating in one-day cricket and just as good in the Test and T20 formats.
With 1956 runs, he is 44 short of becoming the third batsman to reach 2000 T20I runs, after Brendon McCullum (2140) and Martin Guptil (2188), who became the leading run-scorer in this format only on Friday (February 16).
The Indian captain has a chance to become the fastest to reach this landmark too, having played 55 T20Is and the current record is 67.
South Africa's new stumper
With Quinton de Kock ruled out of the T20I series too, Heinrich Klaasen, who gave a good account of himself in the one-day series by scoring 110 runs in four innings (including a match-winning 43* in the rain-hit Johannesburg ODI), appears likely to remain the wicketkeeper. Should he make the playing XI tomorrow, Klaasen will become South Africa's 74th T20I player.
India ahead in head to head
India holds a 6-4 lead in the teams' overall head to head, while it also has won three of the four meetings with South Africa in South Africa. The home team's only T20I victory against India on home soil came in 2012, after losing three in a row from 2006.
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