US opt to bowl first in T20 World Cup opener against Canada

The United States won the toss and decided to field first against Canada in the first match of the T20 World Cup 2024 at the Grand Prairie Stadium in Dallas on Sunday.

It was a fresh wicket and USA would have more clarity while chasing, captain Monank Patel said at the toss, adding, "Playing the World Cup is an amazing feeling. We've sacrificed a lot in the last five years."

Meanwhile, Canada's Saad Bin Zafar expressed confidence in his side's batting capabilities, saying that the surface was good and he did not mind batting first.

"It's a World Cup and we have a full squad, so confident we'll do well. First time we're playing in the tournament, hope to do it with a win," he said. 

In their World Cup opener, the two teams are set to continue cricket's oldest rivalry, which dates back to their first international game in 1844 at St George’s Cricket Club in New York.

Monank Patel will lead the USA, while Saad Bin Zafar will captain Canada.

The two teams have played each other seven times in T20I matches, with the USA winning five and Canada winning two.

USA and Canada are in Group A, along with India, Pakistan, and Ireland.

The USA have come into the tournament with good form, having recently won a series against Canada 4-0 (with one no-result) and a historic 2-1 series victory over Bangladesh.

Canada have a confidence boost by winning a T20 World Cup warm-up match against Nepal.

American batter Aaron Jones appears confident to be playing fearless cricket during the tournament.

“We don't want to regret anything,” Jones said in a media talk before the match. “We want to leave everything out there on the park."

“If we come out on top, it's great. If we don't come out on top, that's how cricket goes sometimes. But we don't want to regret anything.”

Canada’s skipper Saad also expressed confidence. “We have finally made it. We’re finally here," Saad said.

“Everybody's excited. Everybody's itching to go. Everybody's in the performance mood. I think we are ready to go and play some quality cricket in the next few weeks.

“We don't have a lot of pressure on our shoulders. I think we just want to go and express ourselves and play to our potential. That's the brand of cricket that we're looking to play.”

Lineups

Canada: 1 Aaron Johnson, 2 Navneet Dhaliwal, 3 Pargat Singh, 4 Nicholas Kirton, 5 Shreyas Movva (wk), 6 Dilpreet Bajwa, 7 Saad Bin Zafar (capt), 8 Nikhil Dutta, 9 Dilon Heyliger, 10 Kaleem Sana, 11 Jeremy Gordon

USA: 1 Steven Taylor, 2 Monank Patel (capt, wk), 3 Andries Gous, 4 Aaron Jones, 5 Nitish Kumar, 6 Corey Anderson, 7 Harmeet Singh, 8 Shadley van Schalkwyk, 9 Jasdeep Singh, 10 Ali Khan, 11 Saurabh Netravalkar