The 2018 Asia Cup has commenced on Saturday with the match between Bangladesh and Sri Lanka at Dubai International Cricket Stadium. A total of 13 matches in the championship will be played for the next couple of weeks. The final is scheduled to be played on September 28 in Dubai after the league phase and the Super 4 rounds.

In the meantime, the former Indian skipper, Sourav Ganguly has asserted that Team India is firm favorites for the tournament, who will be defending their title in this year’s event. The men in blue will be led by Rohit Sharma in the absence of Virat Kohli, who has been rested as a part of BCCI’s workload management of the players.

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As per the reports in Times Now, Sourav said, “India could not do that well in England but in limited overs, they are a top side. The team is much stronger with Virat but Rohit has a very good record as captain so I expect him to do well too. They are capable of winning (the Asia Cup).”

As far as the Asia Cup is concerned, there is no doubt about the fact that India is the most successful team in the tournament history as they have won six out of the 13 editions ever since the tournament’s inception in 1984. Thereafter, they won in 1998, 1990-91, 1995, 2010 and 2016, the year when the Asia Cup was played in a T20 format bearing in mind the World T20 in India that followed soon after.

This time around, the multi-nation tournament is going to take place in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in the 50-overs format and India are placed in Group A along with Hong Kong and Pakistan. They are scheduled to play their tournament opener against Hong Kong on September 18 in Dubai after which Sharma and his men will be locking horns with arch-rivals Pakistan at the very venue on the next day.