Who is Ashok Sharma? All you need to know about India’s new T20I debutant

Team India is ready to play the first match of the T20I series against Zimbabwe. This series is going to be important for the Indian team and the new captain, Shreyas Iyer, as well. The Indian team need to win this match as they suffered six back-to-back losses in the T20I series.

India vs Zimbabwe 1st T20I playing XI

India (Playing XI): Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Abhishek Sharma, Ishan Kishan(w), Shreyas Iyer(c), Tilak Varma, Rinku Singh, Shivam Dube, Ravi Bishnoi, Prince Yadav, Ashok Sharma, Mayank Yadav

Zimbabwe (Playing XI): Brian Bennett, Tadiwanashe Marumani(w), Ben Curran, Dion Myers, Sikandar Raza(c), Ryan Burl, Wessly Madhevere, Brad Evans, Newman Nyamhuri, Richard Ngarava, Blessing Muzarabani

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Here’s what Indian captain, Shreyas Iyer, said after winning the toss: “We are going to bowl first. This is my first time here, so I don’t know how the wicket is going to play. But looking at the practice wickets and the practice wickets on the side, there was a decent amount of bounce. So definitely, that’s one of the aspects.”

Here’s what Zimbabwe captain Sikandar Raza said after the toss: “This is not your typical Harare Sports Club wicket, I think. There will be something in the start, but I don’t expect it to last too long. I think there are a lot of runs on this wicket and hopefully we can put up those runs on the board.“

Who is Ashok Sharma?

In this first match against Zimbabwe, the Indian team made a big change in their squad as a star player and one of the finest pacers of all time, Ashok Sharma, made his debut for the Men in Blue.

Ashok Sharma is a Rajasthan-born fast bowler, who also showed his brilliance for Shubman Gill’s Gujarat Titans in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2026. Speaking about his career, Ashok Sharma has played 16 T20 matches and took 28 wickets. Meanwhile, in IPL 2026, he played 6 matches and took 6 wickets.

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