Fans to get free entry in Mahendra Singh Dhoni's last match as captain at CCI

Mumbai: Fans will be allowed free entry into the Brabourne Stadium, here, on Tuesday, to watch Mahendra Singh Dhoni’ last match as captain.

Although the match scheduled to be held at the stadium is a practice game between England and India A, it is set to be a high-profile affair.

An earlier report by The Indian Express suggested the Cricket Club of India (CCI), which owns the Brabourne Stadium, were to hold the match without viewers as the police had asked for a larger compensation, anticipating a huge crowd because of Dhoni’s presence.

However, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has agreed to pay the required compensation to the police, which will allow CCI to open the gates for fans.

"Only 40 police officers were set to be deployed initially. There are normally hardly 200-300 people for warm-up matches, but with Dhoni [possibly] playing his last match as captain, the game has become high profile,” ESPN Cricinfo quoted a CCI official as saying.

“There will be a bigger crowd now. So, more police personnel will have to be deployed; there will be around 300 cops now,” said the official.

Teams:

India A (first practice game): Shikhar Dhawan, Mandeep Singh, Ambati Rayudu, Yuvraj Singh, MS Dhoni (capt and wk), Hardik Pandya, Sanju Samson, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Ashish Nehra, Mohit Sharma, Siddharth Kaul.

England XI: Eoin Morgan (capt), Moeen Ali, Jonny Bairstow, Jake Ball, Sam Billings, Jos Buttler, Liam Dawson, Alex Hales, Liam Plunkett, Adil Rashid, Joe Root, Jason Roy, Ben Stokes, David Willey and Chris Woakes.

The match is set to get underway at 1430 hours IST, and will be telecast on Star Sports.