Hardik Pandya‘s exclusion from the starting XI was revealed by captain Rohit Sharma during the toss of the Asia Cup match between India and Hong Kong. In the match against Pakistan, Hardik was named “Player of the Match” for his contributions with the ball and the bat to help his team win. However, Rishabh Pant returned to the lineup against Hong Kong as Hardik rested.

Rohit provided an update on the playing XI and his thoughts on the game after Hong Kong captain Nizakat Khan won the toss and elected to field.

“We would’ve bowled first as well, I believe it will be a good track and we need to bat well to get a good score. We don’t want to look too much into the opposition. Want to play fair and hard cricket. For us, it’s about coming out and doing everything (importantly our basics) right, which we did against Pakistan. Just one change: Hardik is rested considering how important he is for us. Rishabh Pant is in.”

Rohit said

Rishabh was not part of the playing XI against Pakistan.

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India (Playing XI): Rohit Sharma(c), KL Rahul, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Ravindra Jadeja, Dinesh Karthik(w), Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Avesh Khan, Yuzvendra Chahal, Arshdeep Singh
Hong Kong (Playing XI): Nizakat Khan(c), Yasim Murtaza, Babar Hayat, Kinchit Shah, Aizaz Khan, Scott McKechnie(w), Zeeshan Ali, Haroon Arshad, Ehsan Khan, Ayush