Exactly at 10.37 a.m., lumbering clouds parted ways and through the gap, the sun, glorious in its light and warmth, streaked in. Another episode of the fickle English summer was back in play at Old Trafford while Virat Kohli’s men trained here on Saturday.
Rishabh Pant, who joined the squad as a stand-by, wore multiple layers of apparel and heated his gloves with the thud of the white ball delivered by either Jasprit Bumrah or Yuzvendra Chahal. Just as the bowlers wheeled their arms over, albeit gently, the weather gods wavered between bright luminescence and brooding darkness and that remains the backdrop for Sunday’s much-anticipated World Cup clash between India and Pakistan.
It rained here late on Friday night, an insistent shower drenching commuters and cascading down ancient homes and dilapidated factories. The forecast for D-Day is: “light rain showers and a moderate breeze.”
The lone relief is that it doesn’t look as grim as it did at Nottingham where the game involving India and New Zealand was washed out on Thursday. But ominously, as a group of cricket writers reached the venue, the cab driver said: “Trust me, it will rain at 3 p.m., during the match.”
