England captain Harry Brook urged his players to “come back stronger” in the second ODI with India, having slumped to a six-wicket defeat in the series opener at Edgbaston on Tuesday.
White-ball skipper Brook brilliantly steered his troops to a 4-0 series win over India in the T20 internationals – but his team found the going much tougher in the first one-day international.
After winning the toss and choosing to bat, the hosts got off to a flyer as Ben Duckett (43) and Jacob Bethell (14) scored England’s highest opening partnership in 10 ODIs (61).
But they both fell in a fine over from Gurnoor Brar (2-61) and the wickets kept tumbling, with Brook, Jos Buttler and Sam Curran dismissed to leave England reeling on 80 for five.
Dawson and Root show
The hosts were thankful for a 121-run partnership between Liam Dawson (68 off 83) and star man Joe Root (76no off 76), and England scrambled to a total of 258 all out from 47.5 overs.
Axar Patel ended up with handy bowling figures of 4-62 and also contributed with the bat, hitting 57 not out off 52 balls alongside Washington Sundar (52no off 63) as India chased down the target of 259 with 4.4 overs to spare.
India captain Shubman Gill had laid the foundations of the win with a glorious 80 off 75 balls before retiring injured – and with two games to come, England know there is plenty of room for improvement.
On the back foot
Brook told Sky Sports: “I think we lost 5-20 in that middle period, which is always going to put us on the back foot, but I thought the way we fought with the ball just then was phenomenal.
“To get us to a decent total in the end that we thought we could potentially defend, it’s a great effort from the lads.
“We definitely would have liked to play slightly better in that middle period, but getting 260 on the board was a great effort from [Root and Dawson] with a couple of cameos off the back of it as well.
“The pitch changed quite a bit – it got a little bit slower and it just allowed them to cruise along. They only really needed to go at five or six an over.”
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Few more runs needed
Brook added: “If we’d have got a few more runs there, our spinners might have been able to tie them up through the middle, but it all comes back to that 5-20 period which wasn’t ideal.
“On another day, we get 320, 330 and our spinners play a massive part.
“We’ll head to Cardiff, make decisions based on the pitch and hopefully we can come back stronger.”
Praise for India’s bowling
Gill was full of praise for his team’s display, saying: “When you see your middle and lower-middle order score runs and finish the job, it gives you confidence as a captain.
“It was about our combination.
“We have a youngish bowling attack. Our batting is more experienced than our bowling, so even if we had a target of 300 to 320, we backed ourselves to chase that.
“Our bowling in the middle overs was very pleasing. We bowled in the right areas.
“They got away at the end of the powerplay and we were put under pressure, but the way we came back and bounced back was important.
“We’ll try different combinations and see which gives us the best depth in batting and bowling.”
The second ODI takes place in Cardiff on Thursday, July 16, starting at 1pm (UK time).
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