Pakistan vs England 2015, 3rd T20I at Sharjah, Preview: Visitors target whitewash

Pakistan take on England in the third and final Twenty20 International (T20I) at Sharjah on Monday. After winning the first two closely contested T20Is, England will look forward to carry the winning momentum in the final match of the series as well and thereby end their tour to United Arab Emirates (UAE) on a winning note. Pakistan won the Test series convincingly but England showed resilience by winning the ODI series 3-1. They followed it up with back-to-back victories in the T20I series. Although, England has already won the T20I series, the third T20I will be crucial considering both teams would like to take the psychological edge from this match going into future tournaments—ICC World T20 being the big one. SCORECARD: Pakistan vs England 2015, 3rd T20I at Sharjah

England will play an unchanged squad most probably while we may see Pakistan dropping Rafatullah Mohmand in favour of Aamer Yamin. Since, Aamer has not played a T20I so far, Shahid Afridi may prefer sticking with Rafatullah. The pitch at Sharjah will assist the batsmen and the match is expected to be a high-scoring encounter and the team batting first will aim to post a total in excess of 170. The team which wins the toss would ideally like to bat first and put a huge total on board so that they can put pressure on the opposition while defending the total. ALSO READ: England win 2nd T20I and series against Pakistan despite Shahid Afridi blitz at Dubai

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The previous T20I matches went down to the wire and audience will be hoping that they will witness a cliff-hanger on Moday too.  England will bank on fast bowlers Liam Plunkett and Chris Woakes to take key wickets. James Vince, Joe Root and Sam Bilings will hold the strings for England in their batting department. Bilings played a blinder in the first T20I and English fans will want that his good form continues in the final match as well. For Pakistan, Mohammad Hafeez and Shoaib Malik will have to shoulder responsibilities of stabilising the Pakistan innings, if they lose early wickets. Shahid Afridi  did an excellent job with both bat and ball in the previous match. He picked up 3 wickets and scored a 8-ball 24. Wahab Riaz will spearhead the attack while Sohail Tanwir and Anwar Ali will have to give him good support. ALSO READ: Liam Plunkett to have discussion with Trevor Bayliss at the end of England tour of UAE 2015

Squads:

Pakistan: Shahid Afridi (c), Ahmed Shehzad, Mohammad Hafeez, Mohammad Irfan, Anwar Ali, Sarfraz Ahmed (wk), Wahab Riaz, Aamer Yamin, Mohammad Rizwan, Shoaib Malik, Bilal Asif, Imran Khan Jr., Rafatullah Mohmand, Sohail Tanvir, Sohaib Maqsood, Umar Akmal.

England: Eoin Morgan (c), Moeen Ali, Reece Topley, Jason Roy, James Vince, Chris Woakes, Jos Buttler (wk), David Willey, Alex Hales, Liam Plunkett, Adil Rashid, Joe Root, Sam Billings, Stephen Parry, Chris Jordan.

Time:  20:00 local | 16:00 GMT | 21:30 IST

(Bhaskar Narayan is a reporter at CricketCountry and Criclife. He passionately follows the game and is a big fan of Sachin Tendulkar. His Twitter handle is @Cricopathy)