India face resurgent England to stay alive in series

England outplayed India in all the departments for the first time in their tour and won a game convincingly to push the pressure on the hosts. India now need to tick all the boxes with the bat to stay alive in the 3 match series.

The visitors came in with a plan in the first T20 and it was well executed by England bowlers who cut off the scoring areas of the hosts' batsmen at Kanpur.

On the other hand, India struggled to score freely and lack of partnerships has cost them heavily, and it is the short ball that troubled them more than anything else. The only positive was spinner Chahal who showed a lot of spirit.

England

With a convincing victory at Kanpur, England are unlikely to alter the composition of the side unless there is a fitness issue.

Possible XI: 1 Sam Billings, 2 Jason Roy, 3 Joe Root, 4 Eoin Morgan (capt), 5 Ben Stokes, 6 Jos Buttler, 7 Moeen Ali, 8 Chris Jordan, 9 Liam Plunkett, 10 Adil Rashid, 11 Tymal Mills

India

India, on the other hand, are likely to alter the side. Bhuvneshwar Kumar who showed decent outings in last 2 ODIs may get a look-in over Ashish Nehra. The captain might also be tempted to bring in the other leg-spinner Amit Misra into the squad.

Possible XI: 1 Virat Kohli (capt), 2 KL Rahul, 3 Suresh Raina, 4 Yuvraj Singh, 5, MS Dhoni (wk), 6 Manish Pandey, 7 Hardik Pandya, 8 Parvez Rasool/Amit Mishra, 9 Yuzvendra Chahal, 10  Bhuvneshwar Kumar/Ashish Nehra, 11 Jasprit Bumrah

Venue: Nagpur, VCA stadium

Time : 19:00 IST

Pitch

Meanwhile, the pitch at Nagpur is likely to assist spinners more than the Kanpur one, and with big square boundaries, the short ball theory will be tested once again.

India need a performance like Kedar Jadhav's to lift their hopes up in the T20 format against the visitors.