Australia wins toss and elects to bowl first in World Cup final — LIVE

Australian captain Pat Cummins has won the toss and elected to bowl first in the World Cup final against India.

Indian skipper Rohit Sharma confessed he would chosen to bat first anyway.

“I’m shocked,” former Australian wicketkeeper Brad Haddin said on Fox Cricket.

“I thought the Australians would have batted first, put runs on the board in the final and then let the final play out from there.

“Rohit Sharma has obviously read the conditions a lot different to what we did but you get first use of the surface we’re not quite sure how it is going to play but I thought Australia would’ve batted first.”

India is currently 0-13 in the second over, with captain Rohit Sharma (13*) and opening partner Shubman Gill (0*) unbeaten in the middle.

The Australians have named an unchanged XI, as have India.

MATCH CENTRE: World Cup Final, India vs Australia scorecard

Australia XI

David Warner, Travis Head, Mitch Marsh, Steve Smith, Marnus Labuschagne, Josh Inglis (wk), Glenn Maxwell, Mitch Starc, Pat Cummins (c), Josh Hazlewood, Adam Zampa

India XI

Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Siraj

Australia is adamant it will be “ready for anything” India throw at it in the Cricket World Cup final after controversy hit the tournament in a ‘pitch switch’ row.

India have been the form team of the World Cup, winning all 10 games on their way to Sunday’s showpiece match in Ahmedabad.

But there was controversy in the lead-up to their 70-run semi-final in over New Zealand in Mumbai after it emerged the game was being played on a Wankhede Stadium pitch already used twice before during the tournament rather than a freshly-prepared surface.

“No doubt playing on your own wicket in your own country has some advantages,” Australia captain Pat Cummins told a pre-match press conference on Saturday.

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“But we’ve played a lot of cricket over here. We’ll be ready in terms of anything they’ll throw at us … we’ll make sure we have some plans.”

While Cummins was publicly quiet on the issue he raised concerns with ground staff while inspecting the pitch, with one Aussie team figure telling The Age the middle was “rock hard” but it was rough at both ends.

“The verdict was that these patches on both sides of the pitch had not been watered, or not to the same extent, anyway as the centre of the wicket,” Cricbuzz.com reported.

“Leaving the Aussie camp quite convinced that the spinners would come into play a lot more than they have on a number of pitches seen during the tournament, and from early in the piece too.”

The pitch will be the same surface as the one on which India cruised to a seven-wicket pool win over Pakistan last month, when they dismissed their arch rivals for just 191 after winning the toss.

“My understanding is it’s going to be on the slower side,” said India captain Rohit Sharma later Saturday.

“But we have to assess what it is like tomorrow,” he added, pointing out that while there had been dew on the ground ahead of the Pakistan game, none appeared during the match itself.

“That’s why I keep saying the toss is not going to be a factor, you’ve got to play well to win the game regardless of how well you know the conditions.” A used pitch had no major bearing on the Mumbai semi-final, with more than 700 runs scored in the game.

Cummins, asked if he had already seen the pitch for the final, replied: “Yeah, just had a look. It looked pretty firm … I think Pakistan played someone there!”

Used pitches generally favour spinners, with slow bowling a key component of a five-man India attack where Kuldeep Yadav and Ravindra Jadeja are expected to bowl 20 of their 50 overs on Sunday.

Australia have already won the World Cup a record five times and 30-year-old fast bowler Cummins, a member of the victorious 2015 side, was excited by having the opportunity to emulate the likes of Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting by leading the team to another triumph.

“It would be huge,” he said. “We were all kids not too long ago, watching some of those great teams win the 1999, 2003, 2007 World Cups.” He added: “To be captain would be an absolute privilege … it’d be awesome. “It (the World Cup) has got the longest history of a world event where all the teams compete.

“You only get a shot at it every four years. So even if you have a long career, you might only play in two of these events. 2015 is still a career highlight for me, but I think tomorrow, if we win, might pip it.”

The match gets underway at 7.30pm from Narendra Modi Stadium.

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