India and England are locking horns for one final time on this tour in the fifth Test at the Kennington Oval in London. Ben Stokes is missing this Test and England will be led by Ollie Pope who won the toss and had no hesitation in bowling first on a green pitch and under overcast conditions. England had already announced their playing XI with four changes and even India have followed in their footsteps, making four changes, but Arshdeep Singh has missed out on making his debut.
Apart from Stokes, Jofra Archer, Brydon Carse and Liam Dawson will also miss this Test. Chris Woakes is the only bowler to play all five Tests of this series, even as Jacob Bethell, Josh Tongue, Jamie Overton and Gus Atkinson have been included in the playing XI.
Meanwhile, for India, Jasprit Bumrah and Rishabh Pant were expected to miss this Test for different reasons. However, India have also left out Shardul Thakur and Anshul Kamboj from their playing XI, and the four inclusions for this match are - Dhruv Jurel, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep and Karun Nair.
What did captains say after toss?
Meanwhile, Shubman Gill admitted that he was confused yet again at the toss. "Don't mind losing the toss as long as we win the game. Was a bit confused yesterday about what to do, was a bit overcast but the wicket looks good, we'll look to post good runs in the first innings. Should be a good pitch for the bowlers," he said.
As for Pope, he won the toss for the first time in five Tests as captain. "Bit overcast, no-brainer to have a bowl on this pitch. Lost the captain but the others are tracking nicely, we've got a few fresh faces as well. We bat deep, Gus Atkinson and Overton have got runs. We're not going to contend with 2:2, we want to go out there and win it," Pope said.
Here are the playing XIs:
India: Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudharsan, Shubman Gill (c), Washington Sundar, Ravindra Jadeja, Karun Nair, Dhruv Jurel (wk), Prasidh Krishna, Mohammed Siraj, Akash Deep
England: Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pope (c), Joe Root, Harry Brook, Jacob Bethell, Jamie Smith (wk), Chris Woakes, Gus Atkinson, Jamie Overton, Josh Tongue
