Pakistan will start the slight favorites against the West Indies in an ICC Champions Trophy 2013 encounter which promises to be an entertaining one.
The Oval will be filled with a majority of Pakistan fans of course, and they will be hoping for some fireworks from their batsmen and bowlers, but unpredictability will be the name of the game with both sides equally capable of the extraordinary and the disastrous.
"You can associate this with both the teams, mostly these two teams just depend on the talent, and you can say, individuals' performances on a day," Pakistan skipper Misbah-ul-Haq said. "So the best you can say is there is a similarity between the two teams in this particular area."
Misbah believes winning the first match of the tournament is vital, especially when it is a competition between the best eight sides in the world.
"I think in this situation, the first game is very important for any team," he added. "Because you are going to play only three games a round, so the first win will be really important for any team because then you have the luxury to have two more games and just win one and get through to the semifinals.
"So everything just falls to the first one, and if you win that, it obviously puts pressure on the other teams, and your pressure is a little bit eased out. So I think we are looking forward to that, and I'm sure that the West Indies also want to win that, so it will be a good contest."
West Indies have a new one-day international captain in Dwayne Bravo and the enigmatic all-rounder has promised some out-of-the-box thinking.
"I am an attacking captain by nature," he said. "I like to attack. I like to look for wickets. I read the game a lot and I'm very proactive. So you will see some strange placing in my system, strange moves, but sometimes if it does work, I look like a genius, but if it doesn't, then you guys are going to have a go at me.
"But, yeah, I think I'm the type of person that trusts my instincts and believes in my decision that I make and I will stand by it. I have the right team, the right players to do the job that I ask for, so hopefully things can work in our way."
A lot of eyes will also be on the brilliant blade of a certain Chris Gayle, and Misbah admitted there will be some plans in place to stop the left-hander from taking the game away from them.
"Of course, every team has plans against these sorts of players, match winners, and we also have some plans against him," he said. "It's a matter of our execution and how to execute those plans."
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