Former India player turned veteran commentator Aakash Chopra has shown surprise about the Dubai pitch helping the spinners in India’s 2025 Champions Trophy match against Bangladesh. He added that the surface for Thursday’s (February 20) game was virtually like an Indian pitch as well. However, India bundled Bangladesh out for 228 after they opted to bat first. Later, India chased the target down with six wickets and 21 balls to spare to start their campaign with a win.

In a video shared on his YouTube channel ‘Aakash Chopra’, he said, “I will be very honest. When I came here, I felt the pitches would have help for the fast bowlers because the ILT20 was saying that fast bowlers get the wickets and the spinners have a limited role, and that India did wrong in picking five spinners. One spinner is still extra. They could have kept one more fast bowler for a little more variation. However, what has happened to the pitches? This could have been Indore, Kotla, or any other pitch in India which is flat and doesn’t have any grass at all, and if anything, slightly slow. It was incredible and the entire square’s situation is the same.”

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In the same video, Aakash Chopra also stated that India weren’t too wrong in their 2025 Champions Trophy selections, considering the nature of the pitch in Dubai as well.

“Suddenly you start thinking that the selection wasn’t bad. You need spinners here. If the opposing team had played three spinners, they had only two in Mehidy Hasan Miraz and Rishad Hossain, and both reminded us of Ravi bhai (Shastri) for some time (made our life difficult). The ball was turning a lot and since there was no dew later, there was no problem. The pitches are not at all like what the ILT20 story used to say. The pitches are not at all like what I had seen in Dubai previously. It seems like it’s a totally India-like atmosphere,” Aakash Chopra concluded.