The moment you land in Nagpur you feel the heat, literally. Out in the middle, too, it is expected to be as feisty with two World Cup favourites India and South Africa locking horns Saturday.
It is the second week of March and the temperatures in the city are hovering around 37-38 degrees celsius. The afternoon sun is beating down hard on the 22-yard strip and the square. The soaring temperature can be felt with every passing hour of the day. South Africa have been sweating it out in the midday heat for the last two days. They flew down straight from Chennai after their defeat by England on a rank turner.
England not only troubled South Africa with spin, but also with their medium-pacers' reverse swing, a dimension of the game typical to the sub-continent weather. James Anderson and Stuart Broad got the ball to reverse swing in Chennai.
Here too the ball can wobble the other way after losing its shine.
"The wickets we have played on so far have turned. It's basically a reverse role now and we try to support spinners as much as we can," said South Africa's pace bowler Morne Morkel.
"Reverse swing will be the key and quicker we get that going, the better it is for us," he said.
The wicket though is a belter and has lots of runs. The Netherlands gave England a scare in the high-scoring first match here.
"It is going to be as good an ODI strip as we have seen in the earlier matches," says curator Praveen Hinganikar.
A different aspect of the heat could be the fatigue. The visitors say they are used to playing in such conditions and the heat will not tire them out. "Durban is similar to these conditions. I don't think any of our guys are scared to sweat," said Morkel.
