Kadowaki-Fleming leads Japan's Asian Games 15 into a first meeting with India at Sano

Japan meet India for the first time on Tuesday with the same 15 players who will carry their Asian Games campaign, two days after losing a home series to Hong Kong

The one-off Suzuki Cup T20I at the Sano International Cricket Ground in Tochigi Prefecture starts at 9:30am IST on 22 September. It is the first senior international between the two countries in any format.

Kendel Kadowaki-Fleming, Japan's leading run-scorer in T20Is, captains a squad of 15 that is identical to the one Japan will take to the Asian Games in Aichi.

Japan have played 62 T20Is since being granted the status in 2019 and have won 41 of them. India arrive as the reigning T20 World Cup champions.

A squad chosen with the Asian Games in mind

The Japan Cricket Association named the same 15 for the India match as for the Games, leaving out players who qualify to play T20Is for Japan but do not meet Asian Games eligibility rules.

Wataru Miyauchi and Alex Shirai-Patmore are the two wicketkeepers in the squad. Ibrahim Takahashi and Declan Suzuki-McComb are the only players besides the captain with more than 50 T20I appearances.

Jake Kusuda-Nairn, a spin-bowling all-rounder, comes in after impressing in domestic cricket. Tsuyoshi Takada returns to a side he first represented at the ICC East Asia-Pacific Twenty20 Championship in 2013.

Makoto Taniyama wears shirt number 23 in tribute to Shane Warne, having modelled his bowling action on footage of the Australian.

The captain calls the fixture surreal

Kadowaki-Fleming, who has made 1879 runs at 37.58 in T20Is, said the match had not yet felt real. "I don't know what to expect. Even hearing you talk about India playing a cricket match against Japan sounds surreal. I can't wait," he said.

He expects between 2000 and 3000 spectators to travel to Sano from Tokyo and elsewhere in Japan for a ground that is both Japan's first purpose-built cricket venue and the association's headquarters.

The captain described the visiting players as "A-list celebrities" and said the day would bring "plenty of security and probably logistical measures that we haven't experienced in Japan before".

A 17-year-old with a record against Sooryavanshi

Charlie Hara-Hinze, a 17-year-old left-arm spinner who played at the Under-19 World Cup, has already dismissed Vaibhav Sooryavanshi once, at the 2024 Under-19 Asia Cup in Sharjah.

Sooryavanshi is in the India squad that Shreyas Iyer captains for the first time in Sano.

Asked how Japan would handle him, Kadowaki-Fleming said: "Well, our young 17-year-old left-arm spinner has actually got him out before in an Asia Cup at the Under-19 level, so we have got him sorted. Don't worry."

Hong Kong leave Sano with the series

Japan's most recent outing on the same ground was a defeat. Hong Kong won the first T20I of a two-match series on 19 September by four wickets, holding Japan to 95 for 7 and getting home at 99 for 6 in 19.1 overs.

Benjamin Ito-Davis took 3-11 and Hara-Hinze 2-21, but Japan had not given them enough to defend.

The second match, on 20 September, was abandoned without a ball bowled, so Hong Kong took the series 1-0.

A group with Afghanistan and Nepal to follow

The Asian Games men's tournament runs from 24 September to 3 October at Korogi Sports Park in Nisshin. Japan, the hosts, are in Group A with Afghanistan and Nepal.

The top two from each group reach the quarter-finals, where the four seeded sides enter: India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

Both of Japan's group matches fall inside three days, against Afghanistan on 24 September and Nepal on 26 September.

The Suzuki Cup starts at 9:30am IST on Tuesday, two days before Japan open that campaign in Aichi.

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