The big picture: India is looking for more than just solace
India’s T20I tour of Ireland and Great Britain was supposed to be one big event: Vaibhav Suryavanshi’s international debut. Instead, they accumulate new items of an undesirable variety. First ever defeat to Ireland. Lost five T20Is in a row for the first time. First defeat to England in a multi-match bilateral T20I series. The heaviest defeat in the format. Worst loss of the series (even if they win the final game).India have lost only three games in bilateral series so far – a 3-2 thrashing away to the West Indies in 2023. so if they fail to stop the rot at Southampton and prevent a 4-0, these will be another couple of early players to add to the list.
In addition to all the above, England’s victory in the fifth T20 will see them move up India’s top spot in the ICC rankings. It won’t make much difference considering India have won the last two Men’s T20 World Cups, but it will be another small boost for growing captain-coach duo Harry Brooke and Brendon McCullum, who may soon be working together in the red-ball format too. England have won 19 of 22 games since the start of last summer and are playing T20 cricket as well as ever.
Of course, in international cricket there is never a good time to lose, especially when you are trying to move from a champion team, as in the case of India. The only way to break this habit is to win.
Form Guide
India LLLLL (last five completed T20Is, most recent first)
England WWWLW
Spotlight: Jos Buttler and Shreyas Iyer
Another setback in Bristol lasts If Buttlerwent 18 innings short of 40 in T20Is. During this time, his batting average was 15.16 with a strike rate of 131.88, well below his career average. His opening partnership with Phil Salt has historically been England’s strength, but now only one of them is making a contribution.
Prince Yadav knocked out Jos Buttler with his first ball•Getty Images
When he arrived in Belfast for the start of this tour, Shreyas Iyer Of course, I had high hopes. With six games completed, his only success came at the toss (of which he won all six). At least he showed some form of command with the bat, although an unbeaten 80 from 48 in the last game only highlighted the lack of support from his team.
Team News: Lose in disagreement?
When asked about potential rotation, Brook suggested England would “stick to their guns”. Rehan Ahmed was selected for his extra kick on a small pitch at Bristol, but neither he nor Liam Dawson have scored or faced any in their last two games.
England: (probably) 1 Phil Salt, 2 Jos Buttler (week), 3 Harry Brooke (capt), 4 Jacob Bethell, 5 Tom Banton, 6 Sam Curran, 7 Will Jacks, 8 Rehan Ahmed, 9 Adil Rashid, 10 Jofra Archer, 11 Josh Tong
India could bring in Suryansh Shedge for Dube to break up the flow of left-handers and give him another look. They will be without Harshit Rana and Varun Chakravarthy, who both suffered tour-ending injuries in Nottingham.
India: (probably) 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Vaibhav Suryavanshi, 3 Ishan Kishan (wk), 4 Shreyas Iyer (capt), 5 Tilak Varma, 6 Shivam Dube/Suryansh Shedge, 7 Axar Patel, 8 Washington Sundar, 9 Arshdeep Singh, 10 Prince Yadav, 11 Prasidh Krishna
Pitch and conditions: big boundaries and good memories of India
The Utilita Bowl is one of the largest playgrounds in England and is generally uniform in size around the ground. India won their only previous T20I comfortably four years ago. The average first innings score in Hampshire’s six home Blast games this season is 174, with totals of games successfully defended being 173, 190 and 200.
Statistics and trivia
- Dawson’s absence from Bristol ends his streak of 24 consecutive T20I appearances dating back to June last year.
- Adil Rashid will become the sixth player to reach 150 T20I caps for the men’s team if he plays on Saturday. Jos Buttler is set to win his 160th T20I match, moving ahead of George Dockrel and Rohit Sharma to become the second most capped player in the format after Paul Stirling (163).
- Phil Salt faced the maiden in only one of his first 341 T20 appearances – against Sam Curran at Hove in 2018; thanks to Arshdeep Singh, he is now doing it in back-to-back matches.
Quotes
“We play exceptional cricket. We probably didn’t expect to go into Southampton 3-0, but we played some really good cricket.”
Harry Brook says England’s dominance took even him by surprise
“The big prize is in Australia in two years. Do we want to be the team that breaks the 250m record in India and looks great when you hit the top six in the 80m at Eden Gardens? Or do we want to go to places like (Bristol), Manchester and Southampton where things are a little different – and, come to think of it, the MCG and places like that? Do we want to be a team that does well in different conditions?”
Assistant Coach of Team India Ryan ten Doschate challenges his batters to become more adaptable
Alan Gardner is deputy editor of Cricinfo. @alanroderick