With the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur gearing up to host its first international match in eight years on Wednesday, it has been predicted that heavy dew will minimise the toss advantage in India’s opening T20 match against New Zealand.
The dew factor proved to be a decisive factor at the recently concluded T20 World Cup in the UAE where teams preferred to chase in better batting conditions.
"There could be dew in the first innings itself in Jaipur, going by the last two days which will minimise the toss advantage to a certain extent. We will use the anti-dew spray on match day but its effect is very limited. Since it is a T20 battle, we could expect lots of runs from this surface," said an official.
Jaipur had last hosted an ODI match in 2013. Then, India rode on centuries by Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli to chase down Australia's mammoth total of 359 in just 43.3 overs. Jaipur was robbed of international cricket since then mainly due to administrative crisis in Rajasthan cricket.
With no restrictions on the number of audience, a packed crowd is expected at the 25,000 capacity stadium. One has to be at least partially vaccinated to enter the stadium and non-vaccinated individuals can only enter with proof of a negative RT-PCR test.
The T20I game also marks the return of international cricket to India since the Indian Premier League (IPL) which had to be suspended in May due to a devastating second wave of Covid-19 that swept through the nation.