England captain Ben Stokes won the toss and opted to bowl first against India in the first Test of a five-match series at the Yorkshire Cricket Ground in Leeds. Veteran batter Karun Nair is making a comeback in the first Test after a long gap of 300,6 days. He last played a Test match on March 25, 2017, against Australia in Dharamsala. Young batter Sai Sudharsan made his debut in the first Test against England. Both the India and England teams are wearing black armbands for the condolences to the victims of the Ahmedabad aeroplane crash. On June 12, a London-bound Air India plane carrying 242 passengers and crew crashed in a residential area in Ahmedabad minutes after taking off.
India vs England head-to-head
Both India and England have played 136 Test matches against each other, where England holds the edge by winning 51 Tests. India, on the other hand, have won on 35 occasions and both teams have played out a draw 50 times. India last won a Test series on England soil was back in 2007 under Rahul Dravid's captaincy.
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Who replaced Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli?
As Shubman Gill came to toss against England in Leeds, he became the 37th captain to lead India. As Rohit announced his retirement, Sai Sudarshan debuted to feature as an opener. In Virat Kohli's absence, skipper Gill will bat at number four and they have added Karun Nair into the XI who will most likely to bat at number three.
Captains at the toss
Shubman Gill: Would've bowled first as well, might be a bit tough in the first session but it should be good to bat on later. Sun is out, should be a good batting deck for us. Preperation has been amazing, we played a practice game in Beckenham, lads are feeling great. Sai makes his debut, Karun comes in. Sai will bat at three.
Ben Stokes: We'll bowl. Headingley is a very good cricket wicket, we've had some really good games here. Want to try and use the early conditions. Been a long time coming, bit strange that this is just the second series but we're ready. It's been mixed, some lads have played county cricket, we've had three days of really good cricket. Usual suspects in the top seven, Woakes, Brydon, Bashir, Tongue and myself make up the bowling.
India vs England playing XIs
England: Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Ben Stokes(c), Jamie Smith(w), Chris Woakes, Brydon Carse, Josh Tongue, Shoaib Bashir
India: Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudharsan, Shubman Gill(c), Rishabh Pant(w), Karun Nair, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna