England vs India 2018: Heavy rainfall cancels Indian team's training session

Latest weather reports from Birmingham says that heavy showers are going on over the city, which in turn has played spoilsport to the Indian Cricket Team's practice session scheduled for the day. The wet and windy weather is set to continue until later today or even tomorrow, as weather forecasters have predicted thundershowers for tonight and the wee hours of the morning tomorrow.

The temperatures have returned to more typical late-July levels throughout the United Kingdom this weekend, after a series of heat waves earlier last week. Temperatures were near all-time high levels in England during the past month, as evident from the conditions when the T20I and ODI series were played out between India and England. In fact, heat waves were also the primary reason why India's scheduled practice match with Essex was cut short to three days, from the previously-planned time period of four days.

India played its last international match on 17th July 2018, the concluding game of the ODI series against England. The team was then given a break of roughly two weeks to prepare for the upcoming Test series against the same opposition. The practice match versus Essex at the County Ground, Chelmsford was supposed to be a step in the same direction, before it was cut short to three days, with the match not played out completely by then.

Brief scores:

India 395 (Karthik 82, Kohli 68, Walter 113/4), 89/2 (Rahul 36*);

Essex 359/8 declared(Walter 75, Pepper 68, Umesh 35/4).

The game against Essex meanwhile threw a lot of questions up for the Indian contingent during the time it actually happened. The final outcome was a draw, but it probably did not matter as much as the other factors concerned. The players should be satisfied to have obtained ample match practice before the more important games ahead. Provided that the match was played out on a green track which generally troubles the batsmen, most of India's players must be satisfied with how they wielded the willow during the course of their batting.

However, Shikhar Dhawan disappointed, getting dismissed for a pair in the match. With fellow openers Murali Vijay and KL Rahul displaying some decent flair, Dhawan's place in the starting eleven is probably on a bit of a wobble right now. KL Rahul especially, showed good technique while dealing with the moving new ball on Day 3, and thus might have proved why he is a better pick than the southpaw.

KL Rahul

Others like Virat Kohli, Dinesh Karthik, Rishabh Pant and even Hardik Pandya showed a good knack of negotiating with the Duke cricket ball, and India can be satisfied with having so many available options as backup plans even if one or two batsmen fail to do well. While Pujara and Rahane failed to impress in the first innings, they bettered themselves from the previous time, when they got their second chances.

A surprising end-result for India from the game was that the spin triplets of Ashwin, Kuldeep and Jadeja remained wicketless. However, it is to be noted that being a green track, they were assigned just 11 overs between them in the whole game.

Ashwin being slightly injured due to a knock received on his bowling arm during practice made him stay away from the ball on Day 2, while he returned the next day. Umesh Yadav and Ishant Sharma shared seven Essex scalps between them, and it is to be understood that the duo will remain as the pace-bowling spearheads for the visitors.

What is still doubtful, is whether Kohli will choose to play both Ashwin and Kuldeep together in the squad, or opt for just either of them. If he decides to go with the former option, Mohammad Shami will probably be the one who will be replaced.

Umesh Yadav

The first Test match will be played at the Edgbaston Cricket Ground in Birmingham, from August 1st, 2018. Adil Rashid has made a rather sensational-yet-controversial comeback into the English Test side, even after withholding himself from involving in first-class county games for his Yorkshire side since 2018, for "concentrating on limited-over internationals".

It is believed that his commendable showing in the recently concluded successful ODI series might have catalyzed his Test selection, more-or-less as a reply to India's highly rated attack of Ashwin-Kuldeep.

If the rain gods will oblige as soon as possible, both teams will resume practice at the venue, latest by tomorrow noon, according to some local British news sources.