IND vs NZ 2021: Fast bowler Deepak Chahar sarcastically hints at opening the batting in first T20I

Indian seamer Deepak Chahar took to his social media account to jest about opening the batting for India in the first T20I against New Zealand. The New Zealand tour of India will commence today in Jaipur with the first of the three scheduled T20s taking place.

Ahead of the much-awaited encounter, right-arm Indian pacer Deepak Chahar shared a photo of himself alongside skipper Rohit Sharma from a training session. Holding the bat in the picture, Chahar captioned the image:

''All set to open the innings at my home ground tonight. 😃"

You can see the image below:

Being a lower-order batter, it was sarcastic for the 29-year old to suggest this. Chahar, who plays his domestic cricket for Rajasthan, can be seen gathering some batting tips from modern-day white-ball cricket legend and Indian T20I skipper Rohit Sharma in the image. Since its upload, the picture has garnered almost six thousand likes and 530+ retweets.

With regular starters like Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammad Shami rested for the series, Deepak Chahar is likely to find his place in the Indian team for the first T20I.

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First India vs New Zealand T20I to be played today in Jaipur

India v New Zealand - ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2021

Team India will enter a new era in Jaipur when they take the field against New Zealand in the first T20I on Wednesday. This will be their first match with Rahul Dravid as head coach and Rohit Sharma as the permanent T20I captain.

The opening match of the T20I series will be played in Jaipur today (November 17) while Ranchi will be the host of the following encounter on November 19. The caravan will then move further east to Kolkata, where the third and final T20I will be played on November 20.

Players like Hardik Pandya, Rahul Chahar, Shardul Thakur and Varun Chakravarty were dropped from the Indian T20I set-up. This came after their substandard performance at the T20 World Cup 2021.

The key new additions aside from the players that played the World Cup include Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shreyas Iyer, Venkatesh Iyer, Axar Patel and Avesh Khan. Harshal Patel, Deepak Chahar, Mohammed Siraj and Yuzvendra Chahal are also part of the squad.

The Kiwi unit is coming off weary tournament fixtures, so it won't be a surprise if they do lack the intensity. India, on the other hand, can hardly offer any excuses, especially after their humiliating group-stage exit at the T20 World Cup.

It will be interesting to see which combination the duo of Rahul Dravid and Rohit Sharma will field in the first T20I. The first IND-NZ crunch tie will be played at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur today.