Vince earns shock call for decider
James Vince is set to make a surprise return today for a deciding one-day international against india that england are treating as a dress rehearsal for a World cup knockout game.
The Hampshire captain, missing from england action since making 76 in the final Test against new Zealand earlier this year, is on standby to replace Jason Roy, who damaged a finger fielding in the second ODi at Lord’s.
Roy, who is considered a major doubt, will have a fitness test on the laceration to the little finger of his right hand at Headingley this morning and england last night called up sam Billings to provide further batting cover. But of the three it is Vince who is most likely to be playing today.
Vince is fourth choice to open alongside Jonny Bairstow, behind Roy, the injured alex Hales and Dawid malan, who is gaining red- ball practice with the Lions.
and this final 50- over match of the season could represent a significant opportunity for Vince to prove he is simply too good, at 27, to be discarded by england just yet.
There are many observers who consider his real strength to be in the white-ball game.
He made 171 against Yorkshire to take Hampshire to the Royal London cup final and then told Sportsmail ahead of their final victory over Kent that he felt he could have been in at the beginning of england’s 50-over revolution.
‘i came up with people like Roy, Hales and Bairstow when they were changing the way the one-day game was being played and if i’d been in there at the start, you never know, i could have been the one scoring runs and still in the team now,’ Vince said.
‘But you can’t grumble with the way they’re playing, can you?
‘You have to be able to play the way they play now and try to be the next man in if a chance comes up. Things can change very quickly.’
Vince is the next man in now and could force his way back into World cup contention with a significant performance at Headingley in what has become england’s most important 50- over match since last year’s champions Trophy.
Victory at Lord’s on saturday to level this three-match Royal London series has set up just the sort of occasion england can expect if they advance to the closing stages of a home World cup they are desperate to win this time next year.
Last year all their hopes and expectations came to nothing when they surprisingly crashed out of the champions Trophy against Pakistan in the semi-final to waste a golden chance to break their global 50- over tournament duck. now, on what is expected to be another dry, subcontinental-style pitch, they are facing an indian team who are most likely to challenge them for that World cup title next year.
‘if we can treat this game like a World cup semi-final, a must-win with the pressure on, we can learn what we are doing right and wrong,’ said england’s mark Wood. ‘We needed to get better after being beaten into the dirt in nottingham and we responded with a lot of character at Lord’s.’
One man who could do with showing his true character today is Ben stokes, who has looked rusty since returning from his latest injury setback and has yet to impose himself on this series.
Once this game is over england will turn their attention to the Test series and they face a tricky decision on whether to pick stokes for the first Test at edgbaston that is due to finish the day before his court case on a charge of affray begins.
a big performance today might help his cause.
ENGLAND (probable); Bairstow, Vince, Root, Morgan (capt), Stokes, Buttler (wkt), Moeen, Willey, Plunkett, Rashid, Wood.
INDIA (probable): Sharma, Dhawan, Kohli (capt), Rahul, Raina, Dhoni (wkt), Pandya, UT Yadav, K Yadav, Kumar, Chahal.