Team India has been put to bat first at Edgbaston. England captain Ben Stokes won the toss and opted to bowl first in Birmingham, much like the Headingley Test. The hosts had already named their team, making no changes despite Jofra Archer being added to the squad. As for India, they have made 3 changes. Shardul Thakur and Sai Sudharsan have been dropped. Jasprit Bumrah has been rested.
India makes 3 changes to the Playing XI
Sudharsan has been dropped after a forgetful debut, with Karun Nair taking his number three spot. Washington Sundar comes in for Sudharsan and will bat at number eight. Shardul couldn’t do much with the bat or ball and has been replaced by Nitish Kumar Reddy.
Akash Deep comes in for Bumrah. Having played at home against England and in Australia as well, the Indian management backs Akash over Arshdeep Singh, who’s yet to make his Test debut.
Fascinatingly, despite doing poorly with the ball, India have decided to bring an extra all-rounder instead of a proper bowler in Kuldeep Yadav. India captain Shubman Gill explained that weak lower-order batting forced them to do so.
“I would’ve bowled first as well. If there’s anything in the wicket, it’s on the first day. Three changes – Reddy, Washi, and Akash Deep come in. No Bumrah. Just to manage his workload. We did get a good break and this is an important match for us. But the third Test being at Lord’s, we think there’ll be more in that pitch so we’ll use him there. We were tempted to play Kuldeep but looking at the last match, our lower order didn’t do well, so we decided to add some depth to the batting,” Gill said at the toss.
India Playing XI for 2nd England Test
Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Karun Nair, Shubman Gill (c), Rishabh Pant (wk), Nitish Kumar Reddy, Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, Akash Deep, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna
