MATCH: India v England 1st ODI
DATE: Friday, October 14, 2011
TIME: 1430 hours local (0900 hours GMT)
VENUE: Hyderabad
Touted as the ‘revenge series’, England begin their international tour of India with a game against India at Hyderabad.
Past Record:
The last India-England series turned out to be a nightmare for India that they would love to forget in a hurry. They lost the Tests 4-0, ODIs were given away 3-0 and even went down in the T20Is. Nothing short of a convincing win in the series will bring respectability.
Not that England (6/5 at Williams Hills) will be out in India to fill in the numbers, despite their poor recent record in India. In their last two ODI series in India, they have been pummelled in the shorter format of the game and that is the one record they will want to erase from the record annals.
India are 4/5 at 888Sport to make it 1-0.
Team News:
India will be without their injured string of players – all of Sachin Tendulkar, Zaheer Khan, Yuvraj Singh, Virender Sehwag, Ishant Sharma and S Sreesanth have been ruled out of the series. To make matters worse for the side, Harbhajan Singh has been dropped, making the Indian squad a stunningly inexperienced one.
MS Dhoni and Suresh Raina (6/1 at Ladbrokes) are two others who are a part of the team but if they suddenly dropped out of a physical ailment, it would barely come out as a surprise. Their tired bodies and aching bones were on display in the Champions League T20 and while there was no direct evidence to suggest this, the early ouster in the tournament could well be attributed to the cricket excess.
The Indian bowling has a youthful look to it with Rahul Sharma, Varun Aaron and Sreenath Aravind, all with a chance to make their international debut.
England miss Eoin Morgan and Stuart Broad but otherwise, it is a team to beat. Except for the fact that their record in the sub-continent has failed to inspire too much hope, they will be a confident lot – especially with the arrival and emergence of some of their young hopefuls. Jonny Bairstow will lead that category, as would the likes of Craig Kieswetter (9/2 at Boylesports) – who did well for Somerset in the CLT20 in India – and Joss Buttler.
The return of Kevin Pietersen (4/1 at BetFred) after missing out on the home ODI series against India should help, as should the form of Ravi Bopara.
Steve Finn’s hat-trick in the opening warm-up game will push his chances of making to the playing 11 up. Tim Bresnan had had a five-wicket haul in the last match he featured against India in India and he should lead the attack, with Jade Dernbach, to share the new ball with him.
Players to look out for
India will hope for some fireworks from Gautam Gambhir, who had a wretched tour of England but looked to be getting back into form towards the end of the Champions League T20. How Bairstow goes in the backend of the innings could push the game one way or the other.
Prediction:
Nothing to choose from between the two sides – another tie, after one in the World Cup and another in England, could be a good result!
