Asia Cup  

'Lot of spots are up for grabs like Nos three, four and six. All these guys (Kedar, Manish, Rayudu) are eyeing for those slots. We want to give chances to as many guys for this particular series. In this tournament, we need to seal the batting slot Nos four and six,' Rohit Sharma said on the eve of the team’s opener against Hong Kong

'Virat Kohli's absence won't be a factor, they are a better side,' Sourav Ganguly said, adding Pakistan too have improved on their performance

Dubai: India are set to open their Asia Cup 2018 campaign against Hong Kong in Dubai on Tuesday and stand-in captain Rohit Sharma is "nervous" as well as "excited" to take up the responsibility of the leader in Virat Kohli's absence. Rohit said he and his team-mates were not worried about the heat factor in UAE and were focused on doing well in all matches.

'We will work on it in our next practice session. It's a good win but to win against India we have to be at our best in all the three departments,' Sarfraz Ahmed said

Mushfiqur Rahim scored the bulk of the Bangladesh runs as he and Mithun took their side out of the woods after being reduced to one run for two wickets and opener Tamim Iqbal returning to the pavilion after an injury only to come back at the fag end of the innings

'Not everywhere do you get quality net bowlers and it becomes a problem for the senior team during practice sessions. With back to back games, you don't expect a Bhuvneshwar Kumar or a Jasprit Bumrah to bowl flat out at the nets,' BCCI official said

The focal point would be how India play a quality Pakistan who have a world-class fast bowler in Mohammed Aamir, a solid all-rounder in Hasan Ali, a prolific opener in Fakhar Zaman and talented batsmen such as Babar Azam and Harris Sohail