England vs India 2018, third Test: Preview

After the first two Test matches, it would be quite unrealistic to expect from the Indian team to turn the table in their favour. But from the team that went there with a lot of commitments and expectations, apart from being the number one Test side in world cricket, it's not much that you are asking from them.

Coming to the weather at Trent Bridge, it would be windy as expected and will provide movement to the seam bowlers. It means that it will be yet another a single spinner per side encounter. So, the Indian team is expected to improve their mistake from the last match of playing two spinners and Kuldeep Yadav, for that matter will have to warm the bench.

Another expected change which is almost confirmed is that Rishabh Pant will make his test debut as a wicketkeeper in place of out-of-form Dinesh Karthik. Shikhar Dhawan may also come back in place of either Murali Vijay or KL Rahul. Another very unparticular thing that might also happen is that India may take the field with six specialist batsmen and drop Hardik Pandya as batting has been a deep trouble for this Indian side.

Playing three quality fast bowlers in the form of Shami, Ishant and Bumrah will always keep India in the game against not a very strong English batting line-up.

For England, making changes is not a concern but pleasure as Ben Stokes got a clean chit from the court and got available for the third test. This meant that England had to drop either of their Man of the Match from the last two games, i.e, Sam Curran and Chris Woakes. SThe management decided to drop the young left-arm all-rounder Curran to make way for Stokes.

Toss:

As the pitch and weather will be complementing the fast bowlers a lot, so, the team winning the toss will definitely look to bowl first and the team batting first will be asked a lot of questions with the ball.

Playing XIs:

England: Keaton Jennings, Alastair Cook, Joe Root (c), Ollie Pope, Jonny Bairstow (wk), Jos Buttler, Ben Stokes, Chris Woakes, Adil Rashid, Stuart Broad, James Anderson.

India (Probable XI): Two of Shikhar Dhawan/ Murali Vijay/ KL Rahul, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli (c), Ajinkya Rahane, Rishabh Pant (wk), Hardik Pandya, Ravichandran Ashwin, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah