India vs England: England look to keep series alive

England and India go head to head in the second T20 International at Cardiff on Friday at 2200 hrs (IST). Virat Kohli and his troops look well set with combinations as they tyrannized the opposition with a dominating performance at Old Trafford, Manchester. England, on the other hand, will look to keep the series alive by displaying a better performance at Cardiff.

Kuldeep Yadav seemed unplayable in the first game as the majority of the batsman transferred their body weight on front foot playing a full tossed up delivery failing to pick the wrong’un. In the quest, they fell over and were stumped or caught in the deep. Jos Butler was the only player who played Kuldeep with utter precision. He stayed on the back foot and maneuvered him around the field for singles and doubles. Even if he did not pick the delivery from his hand, he managed to do it off the pitch. It was a smart ploy by the England wicketkeeper-batsman. Eventually, he perished to the same bowler in 18th over when he tried to slog one out of the park as he was left with no other option.

Chris Jordan still feels English batsman will triumph in the second T20 if they continue playing on the front foot. He backs the brute line up as they have done pretty well against spin since 2015.

“If we still try to stay on the front foot as much as possible and keep putting pressure back on them, I hope we’ll be okay,” he said.

Also read: Jasprit Bumrah ruled out of England T20s with finger injury

England has only one option in reserves in the form of Jake Ball as Sam Curran and Dawid Malan is going to feature at the T20 Blast. They might go in with the same squad despite the one-sided affair at Manchester amidst talks on Liam Plunkett being replaced by Jake Ball in the side but Eoin Morgan has shown a lot of faith in the 33-year-old as he has picked crucial wickets for England in the recent past. Thus, it is highly unlikely that any changes will be seen in the second T20.

Virat Kohli will be tempted to try the young talent Deepak Chahar as he has performed consistently leading to the build-up of his maiden India call-up but he might want to give another chance to the veteran swing bowler Bhuvaneshwar Kumar who had an off day in the first encounter giving away 45 runs in his four overs.

England (Possible XI) – Jos Buttler (w), Jason Roy, Joe Root, Alex Hales, Eoin Morgan (c), Jonny Bairstow, Moeen Ali, Adil Rashid, Liam Plunkett, David Willey, Chris Jordan

India (Possible XI) – Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Virat Kohli (c), MS Dhoni (w), Suresh Raina, Hardik Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Umesh Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav