Will be difficult for India as Pakistan have been in Colombo for two weeks: Ryan ten Doeschate

Ryan ten Doeschate, the assistant coach, has expressed his happiness that the Pakistani cricket team has now changed its mind on playing India in the 2026 T20 World Cup. India will play Pakistan on February 15 in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

PCB reversed its stance of not playing India in the ongoing tournament after weeks of negotiations with the ICC and after the ICC assured that Bangladesh will not be penalized for their refusal to play in the ICC T20 World Cup 2026.

According to Ten Doeschate, the Indian squad was always confident about their matchup with the Men in Green and anticipated some talks that would restore the original schedule of the crucial Group A match in the twenty-team competition.

The assistant coach added that India will ultimately be better prepared if they play a formidable team like Pakistan in the event's group round.

"First of all, it's great that the game's back on. We kind of never changed our preparation; we knew that the game wasn't going to happen. We were always under the impression that something would transpire and we would play. So it's no big change the way we are going about things. And I guess we kind of got confirmation sort of late yesterday and early this morning. It started coming through that the game was going to go ahead, and we are delighted to have another chance to play against the quality side in this first phase of the tournament," ten Doeschate was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo.

The Indian team is confident of winning despite Pakistan playing in Colombo for the past two weeks.

Before playing them on Sunday, February 15, at the R. Premadasa Stadium, the Salman Ali Agha-led team would have been in Colombo for a few weeks, which worries the Indian dugout.  

Ten Doeschate spoke for the team when he stated that the Indian side must give it their all in the match to ensure that Suryakumar Yadav and company do not jeopardize their hopes of making it to the Super Eights.

"We kind of accepted that as a status quo (to play), and until we got there and they didn't show up, we were assuming we were going to play. We also, we're trying to stay clear of all the politics I've mentioned before about the sentiments of the country and know the different politics between the two countries, but it's really important for us just to focus on the cricket side of things. It's going to be a challenge going to Colombo, where Pakistan has been for the last two weeks, and we are fully focused on just bringing our best game to that fixture next week," he added.

In a tantalizing match, India will also play Namibia before facing Pakistan on Thursday, February 12, at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in New Delhi.

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