LIVE - India v England – 1st Test: Toss Report – MS Dhoni won the toss and opted to field
The battle for the World’s Test number one is all set to take off at the historical Lord’s cricket ground, with England batting first.
The Indian skipper, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/MS-Dhoni-c2028 won the toss and, as anticipated, opted to bowl first in the bowler friendly overcast conditions. He hoped that the seamers would earn India some early breakthroughs.
The damp wicket in the dull and cool conditions will provide much needed assistance to the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/P-Kumar-c2143.
Stylish http://www.senore.com/Cricket/SK-Raina-c2539 has been called in his place. Dhoni said that it was a difficult decision to pick Raina ahead of Yuvraj.
The England Test skipper, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/AJ-Strauss-c964 termed the Lord’s deck as really good to start with the ball under the overcast conditions, adding that they too would have decided to bowl first had they won the toss. He further added that the first hour of the
day would be quite important.
Former India captain, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Sourav-Chandidas-Ganguly-c90746 also termed Lord’s wicket as good one with a tinge of green. He reckoned that hitting the ball in the right areas and bowling dot balls would be quite helpful for Indian bowlers to put the English top-order under pressure.
Earlier, the weather conditions led to a delayed start to the series opener. Weather forecast for London suggested that a heavy spell of rain may halt proceedings on the Day one of the high profile, 2000th match in the history of Test cricket.
Playing XIs:
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/JM-Anderson-c1705, 11 Chris Tremlett.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Harbhajan-Singh-c61453, 9 Zaheer Khan, 10 Ishant Sharma, 11 Praveen Kumar.
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