IndvsEng, 2nd ODI: Cricket Match Preview

Cuttack: After having lost 1^st ODI despite scoring 350, the England team management must be a worried a lot as how to take on an inaccessible team India.

True that you don’t lose match every time when you score 350 but what must be discerning for the visitors, in the manner Indian batsmen led by Virat Kohli approached the target. It was a clinical batsmenship and display for total supremacy of the hosts which undid the England. Once again, Indians proved that they are the best chasing side in the world and that too not on paper but on the field.

Following a spectacular Virat-Kedar show in the 1^st ODI, Indian Cricket team would like to seal the series when they face England in the second One Day International at Barabati Stadium here on Thursday.

With everybody around the globe singing is showering praise on Indian skipper and another wonderful finisher in Kedar Jadhav, the hosts may still enjoy the luxury to make certain experiments in the batting line up despite the weak link in the first ODI being the bowling.

The richness in the Indian batting line up is proved by the fact that India scored over 350 runs in the chase despite top four of the first fives including Shikar Dhawan, KL Rahul, Yuvraj Singh and MS Dhoni failed to deliver and another regular Ajinkya Rahane was not in the eleven.

Dhoni, during his six-ball inning, cleared his intent of playing aggressive cricket but then it was not according to plan. “Dhoni tried to hit every ball to the boundary in his short six-ball inning. Earlier, Mahi used to stick at the crease whenever team had lost early wickets before the end of first powerplay,” said commentator Sanjay Manjrekar during the course of the first ODI.

England, still, does not have to worry much as many of its frontline batsmen showed good form. The defeat may have been a dampener for England but it has the talent aplenty to offer good fight in the remaining ODIs and T20. The Englishmen are a good batting lot comprised of Joe Rot, Skipper Eoin Morgan, Jason Roy and Ben Stokes.

As far as the bowling goes, both the teams are seemingly on the same level with bowlers from both the sides need to bowl according to field and the plan of the team management.

• India has played 17 ODIs at Barabati stadium here, out of which, it has won 11 times. India and England have faced each other four times in which both have won two matches each.
• Virat Kohli is 28 runs short of 1000 runs as a skipper.
• Ravindra Jadeja is two wickets behind becoming first Indian left-arm spinner to take 150 ODI wickets.

Teams:

India: Virat Kohli (captain), Lokesh Rahul, Shikhar Dhawan, Yuvraj Singh, MS Dhoni (wk), Kedar Jadhav, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin, Jasprit Bumrah, Umesh Yadav, Ajinkya Rahane, Manish Pandey, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Amit Mishra.

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