Australia won the toss and decided to bowl against India
Mitchell Marsh continued his impressive run with the coin and, unsurprisingly, opted to bowl in the first T20I of the five-match series in Canberra.
Sean Abbott is the pace bowler to miss out for Australia as Xavier Bartlett and Nathan Ellis play alongside Josh Hazlewood who is only available for the first two matches of the series before he switches focus to Ashes preparation. Matt Kuhnemann takes the spot of Adam Zampa who is missing for personal reasons.
Australia have chosen to bowl in all 18 T20Is where Mitchell Marsh won the toss. Suryakumar Yadav, the India captain, said he was happy to bat.
Despite conditions being a world away from Dubai, India have retained the three frontline spinners they used in the Asia Cup final with Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel and Varun Chakravarthy all finding spots in the XI. Jasprit Bumrah will lead the pace attack that also includes Harshit Rana.
Allrounder Nitish Reddy has been ruled out for the first three T20Is. He was recovering from a left quadriceps injury sustained during the second ODI in Adelaide but has complained of neck spasms, which have impacted his recovery and mobility, according to a BCCI update.
For Australia, this will be their most significant challenge over the last few months among a hefty run of T20 series which has included victories over West Indies, South Africa and New Zealand.
From their first-choice side they are also missing Cameron Green (Shield cricket), Glenn Maxwell (wrist injury, will return for game three). Josh Philippe plays his first T20I since 2023. Matt Short was ruled out of the first two matches of the series with a finger injury sustained in the second ODI which required surgery earlier this week.
Australia 1 Mitchell Marsh (capt), 2 Travis Head, 3 Josh Inglis (wk), 4 Tim David, 5 Mitch Owen, 6 Marcus Stoinis, 7 Josh Philippe, 8 Xavier Bartlett, 9 Nathan Ellis, 10 Matt Kuhnemann, 11 Josh Hazlewood
India 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Shubman Gill, 3 Tilak Varma, 4 Suryakumar Yadav (capt), 5 Sanju Samson (wk), 6 Shivam Dube, 7 Axar Patel, 8 Harshit Rana, 9 Kuldeep Yadav, 10 Varun Chakravarthy, 11 Jasprit Bumrah
Andrew McGlashan is a deputy editor at ESPNcricinfo
