England V India Series 2018

The 4th morning and India resume on their overnight 110/5 with the prospect of the test heading towards a thrilling climax.

Yes a thrilling climax to a match which was gripping throughout, with England winning by 31 runs. Stokes was England's hero on the final morning, but now has to go through his court case for affray.

Ah. Lords in August, 2nd test about to start in less than 5 hours and it's raining!

Still, never mind, we can still speculate as to what the England team might be, barring injuries. My best bet below:-

Cook
Jennings
Root
Pope
Bairstow
Buttler
Woakes
Curran
Rashid
Broad
Anderson

Not much of a bet really as Pope has already been confirmed at No. 4 so it should come down to a choice between Woakes and Moeen Ali.

As for India, is Jasprit Bumrah fit? Will Cheteshwar Pujara get a recall? Will they play 2 (or 3) spinners? (Jadeja and/or Kuldeep Yadav) If I were India, the way England play spinners, I'd play all 3 and persuade Harbhijan Singh to come out of retirement and make a fourth!

Drizzle throughout Thursday meant no play on the first day, but we finally get underway on the second morning. The England team given above by Hawaiian Brian turns out to be correct, whilst England won the toss and elected to field first.

An excellent all-round performance from England and a vast improvement on edgbaston but there are still one or two things to be sorted out. The slip catching is still shoddy and the opening position is still up for grabs, it might be a good idea to drop jennings and let root open temporarily until we can find a proper opener.

Yes still one or two things to be sorted out, and not least is the question of who gets left out for Stokes after an impressive performance from Woakes in the second test. His 137 not out by itself beat both India's scores of 107 all out and 130 all out. I've heard Rashid suggested, who didn't bat and didn't bowl at Lords, although the whole match only lasted 170.3 overs and we'll probably need a spinner elsewhere. Buttler's also been mentioned. It could even be Jennings if Root were to open the innings as lancealot suggests.

According to the Times yesterday, Stokes is not selected for the third test, although the day before they were indicating he was back in the squad and likely to play.

Trent Bridge on Saturday. Last test there (in 2017) we were hammered by the South Africans by over 300 runs. Two years earlier we hammered Oz by an innings and plenty, bowling them out for 60 in the first innings. (Broad 9.3 overs, 8 for 15!)

Hope Kohli's fit to play or it could be a similar drubbing.

I think there are many that probably feel that Stokes should play Saturday, but at the same time I feel Stokes would have been far better to have have a bit of time with his family and been dealt with by the ECB disciplinary committee first before been made available for selection there will be many who would say he should not be playing in the team but I feel he has served punishment enough by not playing in Oz last winter

Who would you drop to play Stokes.
Knowing that useless manager he'll probably drop the hero of the first test - Sam Curran

Since Stokes is playing it meant leaving out the man of the match for the last test (Woakes) or the man of the match for the previous match (Curran). We are so strong in all rounders right now, which means that Curran can't get a game this time and neither can Ali.

England have won the toss this morning and as in the last test have asked India to bat first.