New-look India begin campaign against England

LEEDS: A new captain, a headstrong coach, a few from the old guard and some fresh faces will be determined to create a compelling narrative during the next 45 days when an in-transition India take on an equally combustible England in a five-Test series for the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy starting in Leeds on Friday.

That only three Indian teams -- Ajit Wadekar's batch of 1971, Kapil's Devils in 1986 and Rahul Dravid's sprightly bunch in 2007 -- have won a Test series in Old Blighty in the past nine decades doesn't make for a rosy picture.

Neither does the fact that India's most devoted long-format cricketer of the past decade, Virat Kohli, has walked into Test sunset making the batting line-up look slightly thin on experience.

For the 25-year-old Shubman Gill, this series will be nothing short of a baptism by fire against an England side, which has changed the conventions of Test match batting under Brendon McCullum's coaching and Ben Stokes's captaincy.

An unusually warm Leeds (maximum temperature on Friday could be 29 degree celsius) and the 8mm grass laden 22-yard surface at the Headingley isn't exactly a paradise for England's proverbial 'Bazballers' but this series will be about which batting unit blinks first under pressure.

England's batting with Joe Root, owner of 13,000 plus Test runs including 36 hundreds, looks superior on paper compared to India as the visiting team's most experienced batter is KL Rahul (58 Tests, 3257 runs).

But the presence of a peerless Jasprit Bumrah in the Indian bowling unit puts the visitors on even keel. This despite the pace spearhead being available for only three Tests.

Despite the absence of Kohli and Rohit Sharma, who played his best Test cricket in the 2021 series, this could be India's best chance to put pressure on an English bowling line-up that wouldn't have the quality that James Anderson and Stuart Broad brought for two decades.

An attack comprising Chris Woakes, Brydon Carse, Josh Tongue and Shoaib Bashir with skipper Stokes to complement them doesn't exactly strike fear in the opposition ranks.

Head coach Gautam Gambhir, easily the most powerful man in the Indian change room after the departure of Kohli and Rohit, wouldn't want his already blemished record of six defeats to worsen any further. The series would be first real test of tactical acumen for Gambhir.

While Karun Nair's comeback seems to be a given if one went by slip cordon's composition during practice, where he was stationed at first slip, there will be one more batting slot that needs to be fretted upon.

Would Gambhir play an extra batter and hand the talented B Sai Sudharsan his maiden Test cap? Or does he play both seam bowling all-rounders in Nitish Reddy and Shardul Thakur to compensate for the lack of an extra specialist batter? Agnecies

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