IND VS ENG 5th ODI highlights

Kolkata: Indian spinners sparked an England collapse after skipper MS Dhoni's fireworks with the bat to hand the visitors a 5-0 bashing by winning the fifth ODI by 95 runs here at the Eden Gardens on Tuesday.

After Varun Aaron broke the 129-run opening stand between Craig Kieswetter (63) and skipper Alastair Cook (60), India's spin attack of Ravindra Jadeja, R Ashwin, Suresh Raina and Manoj Tiwary took nine wickets between them to dismiss the visitors for 176. Of these, Jadeja was the most successful bowler with a spell of 4/33.

Earlier, Indian skipper Dhoni's not out effort of 75 off 69 balls carried India to a formidable total of 271/8.

Indian openers Ajinkya Rahaje and Gautam Gambhir gave their team a solid start of 80 but India were jolted by losing three wickets at the same score.

But Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja and Praveen Kumar gave their skipper the support he needed to take India to a challenging total.

Sachin Returns

Mumbai: Batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar has started training after a month he was ruled out of action due to a toe injury during the One-Day International series in England.

Tendulkar visited the Bandra-Kurla Complex in Mumbai on Friday, where he was seen joggling lightly on the sidelines of a C. K. Nayudu Under-22 game between Mumbai and Gujarat, Hindustan Times reported.

The Little Master suffered recurrence of an inflammation to the bone in his big toe on the right foot, ahead of the first ODI against England at Cardiff, due to which he had to return to India.

The same injury kept him out of the Champions League Twenty20 tournament, which was won by his team Mumbai Indians.

Tendulkar could be aiming to get fit before the home series against the West Indies in November, which would help him prepare better for the Australia tour starting on December 26.

The report also said Tendulkar might comeback for the fourth ODI against England, which will be played in Mumbai.

New ODI rules confusing for now: Kohli

New Delhi: India's middle-order batsman Virat Kohli finds the new ODI rules introduced by the ICC confusing and feels that the playing condition, which allows for a run out if a batsman is deemed to have obstructed the field, is "vague".

The new ICC rules came into application in the ongoing five-match India-England series, the first game of which India won by 126 runs in Hyderabad.


"It is a good change. It might turn out to be more interesting and exciting eventually but in the first match it was very confusing. The run out rule is a little vague, no one knows how the obstruction rule will apply," Kohli said on the eve of the second ODI here on Monday.

According to the new rule, on appeal from the fielders, if the umpire feels that a batsman, while running between the wickets, has significantly changed his direction without probable cause (to save his wicket) when a fielder attempts to run the batsman out, should be given out "obstructing the field". It shall not be relevant whether a run out would have been effected or not.

For making a decision to declare the batsman out obstructing the field, the on-field umpires may consult the third-umpire.

There were four run outs in the first ODI (India 3, England 1) but none involved the 'obstructing the field' rule.

Among the other changes, each fielding side is given two new balls to be used in alternate overs, one at each end. The mandatory change of the ball after the 34th over of an innings will not take place anymore.

The two powerplay blocks, which the bowling team and the batting team decide to take as per their wish after the end of first 10 overs (Mandatory Powerplay) will not be taken earlier than the 16th over nor be completed later than the 40th over.

Talking about Monday's match, Kohli said he expects the Feroze Shah Kotla pitch to be its usual slow self and India would be relying more on the spin department to deliver the wickets on such a track.

"Delhi wicket has always been on slower side, there won't be too much of bounce but I think this time it would be better than before for sure," he said.

"Spinners would be our strength, we have good pacers also but spin is our strength and we will capitalise in the middle overs using our spinners," he added.

Going into the match after a massive win in the lung-opener, India strike a confident pose after the hammering the team got in the shambolic tour to England. Kohli said the Hyderabad win was just the kind of boost India needed.

"Obviously it's confidence booster after the England series, we have been preparing for some time. We were keen to do well. The fact that we beat them with a big margin, it was a convincing victory so it will obviously give us confidence.

We will take this confidence into the next game on Monday," he said.

"Some youngsters have been coming up and they have done well against a strong England team. It will give them a lot of confidence and whenever in future they play for India, they will use this confidence," he added.

Recalling the horrendous tour, during which India failed to win a single international game, Kohli said part of the disaster was also caused by weather gods especially during the ODI series.

"In England, we did really well in ODIs, we could not win because of certain unfortunate circumstances such as rain but we gave them a good fight. We have always been in a calm, confident and collected space and we always had the confidence," he said.

IND VS ENG 2nd ODI live

New Delhi: By ending their 10-match win-less streak against England in the first one-dayer at Hyderabad, Team India once again exhibited their invincibility at home, to the dismay of the opposition. The depleted Team India, which is without the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Rohit Sharma and Zaheer Khan, will go head to head in the second encounter at Feroz Shah Kotla in New Delhi hoping to take a 2-0 lead in the five-match series.

India won the first match on a slow wicket thanks to some brilliant batting by skipper MS Dhoni who led from front and Suresh Raina. Dhoni scored a match-wining knock of 87 off just 70 deliveries as the hosts piled on an imposing total of 300/7 in their quota of fifty overs. Another bright spot in Indian team is the rise of Ravindra Jadeja who has improved vastly since the 2009 T20 World Cup. The left-hander scored a fighting 27 and took three important wickets and would once again be the one to look out for on the slow Kotla wicket.

Delhi lads Gautam Gambhir and Virat Kohli also got off to a decent start and the duo could be a real handful for the English if they keep on going their merry way. The two have enough experience to enthrall their home crowd if they find their feet in the middle. Gambhir and Kohli have been in great form in the Champions League T20 and will be hoping to set off some Diwali fireworks for all the fans worldwide. The team management will surely be going with Parthiv Patel and young Ajinkya Rahane who failed to make their mark in the first ODI, but possess enough quality in them to make a comeback. The Indian batting order looks formidable, and it will be a near impossible task for the England bowlers to dominate them in their own backyard.

The Indian spin bowling was brilliant in the first ODI, R Ashwin once again proved that he is the best man for the job after Harbhajan Singh. He, along with Jadeja, spun a web around the batsmen and forced them into errors which cost the English team dearly. The Delhi pitch will offer the same assistance to the spinners and the duo will once again hold the key on sluggish Kotla turf. Pacers Praveen Kumar and Umesh Yadav were right on the money and took three wickets between them and built the pressure early on in the innings. With the talented Varun Aaron and Rahul Sharma waiting in the wings, competition for places will be the order of the day, but the team's think tank is likely to go with the winning combination for the second ODI.

On the other hand England's bowling and batting was dismal in the first ODI. Apart from Grame Swann, the English bowlers were easily tackled by the strong Indian batting. Bresnan and co. were toothless in the death overs and were unable to make most of the early wickets. It was the same story in the batting department for England, as they were bundled out for just 174 inside fifty overs.

Craig Keiswetter, Jonathan Trott and Kevin Pietersen failed to make any impact for the visitors. Skipper Alaistair Cook was the only key contributor with a well-made fifty but he also eventually perished trying to up the ante. The visitors will need something special from KP and Cook if they are to seriously pose a challenge for India in the second ODI. The English batsmen will have to pull up their socks if they want to take the fight to the opposition, or else the five-match series might fizzle out into a one-sided affair in favour of the hosts.

IND VS ENG 1st ODI - Not a revenge says MS Dhoni

HYDERABAD: The India-England series has been billed as a 'revenge series' but Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni chose to play down the issue after his stellar show in the first ODI against England.

 "I believe revenge is a very strong word. If you look at the England series especially the second half, we did play well. We scored runs but unfortunately there were rain interruptions and the ball used to become heavier and tougher for our bowlers to grip," Dhoni said at the post match media interaction after India beat England by 126 runs in the first ODI.

 "This is a series where the idea is to groom the youngsters. Also this win came after a long time and it was an important win. You can't enjoy playing the game if you lose too many matches," the skipper said candidly.

 Dhoni termed his unbeaten 87-run knock as one of his "precious innings" and said today he played like he used to do at the start of his career.

 "I normally don't believe in rating my performance but yes this innings is a precious innings for me. Over the years, I have played some good knocks and this one is also a valuable one. Once I started batting at No 6, I had remodelled my game. This innings of mine was a very well calculated one."

 "I tried a lot of aerial shots which I normally don't play nowadays. I was practising a lot of hitting over the cover region. I felt this was the right match to try out and it worked well," he added.

 He feels that batting at No 6 is something that shouldn't be entrusted on any junior player as it would be asking too much from him.

 "Often on sub-continent tracks, if you send a junior guy, he might not get enough deliveries and get out scoring 10 or 15. Then again on a good strip he may just score around 35 and not get enough time to score big fifty or a 80," Dhoni observed.

 "After 15 matches, you will see that particular player's average in the range of 25 to 30. That's why you need to send them up and give them as much opportunities possible. Look how Yuvraj Singh transformed his game batting at that position," he quipped.

 Dhoni felt that lack of dew was one factor that helped his bowlers stick to the right lines.

 "Yesterday in the evening, I saw there was a fair bit of dew but today fortunately there wasn't any dew. That really helped our cause. Also the dryness in the outfield offered a bit of reverse swing as well," Dhoni explained.

 He lauded young Ravindra Jadeja's effort as the all-rounder scored a quick 27 and then grabbed three wickets for 34 runs.

 "Jadeja is an important player as he brings in a lot of stability to the side," Dhoni said.

 About the new Powerplay rule, Dhoni said, "It was important for us to rotate the strike initially. There was a bit of uneven bounce but I won't say too much. The new Powerplay means that even if you take it in the 36th over, still you have 10 overs left. Therefore, you can't go all out.

 "I reckon 250-260 would have been a good score and in the end we got 300."

 Dhoni ruled out the idea that he would depend more on spin to counter the English batsmen as the visitors have found it uncomfortable.

 "Had it been April or May when it's dry and humid with the pitches offering lot of turn, I would have said that I would go with three spinners and two seamers. But in these circumstances when we are approaching winter season, we still don't know whether their will be dew in Delhi and Mohali," he reasoned.

IND VS ENG 1st ODI - We were outplayed in all departments says Cook

Hyderabad: England captain Alastair Cook credited India for their comprehensive 126-run win and said the home team completely outplayed the visitors in the first ODI here on Friday.

After posting a challenging 300 for seven, India shot out England for 174 runs in 36.1 overs to take a 1-0 lead in the five-match series.

"It was an important toss to win. We saw at the end that the ball kept low. But credit to India. They outplayed us in all departments today," Cook said after the match.

"We're going to learn from this, and that's the beauty of a five-match series."

India's newest spin duo of Ravichandran Ashwin (3/35) and Ravindra Jadeja sizzled in the slow conditions, sharing six wickets between them and Cook said tackling the tweakers will be a challenge for his batsmen in the series.

"We know that (playing spin) is an issue, and that's a skill thing. We're going to work hard on that in the next couple of days," he said.

IND VS ENG 1st ODI Highlights

Hyderabad: Back in form with a match-winning knock against England, Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni said the unbeaten 87 in the opening ODI here was one of his most "precious and well-calculated" knocks.

"I normally don't believe in rating my performance but yes this innings is a precious innings for me. Over the years, I have played some good knocks and this one is also a valuable one. Once I started batting at No 6, I had remodelled my game.

MS Dhoni said the unbeaten 87 in the opening ODI here was one of his most precious knock.

This innings of mine was a very well calculated one," Dhoni said at the post match media interaction after India beat England by 126 runs in the first ODI last night.

"I tried a lot of aerial shots which I normally don't play nowadays. I was practicing a lot of hitting over the cover region. I felt this was the right match to try out and it worked well," he added.

He feels that batting at No 6 is something that shouldn't be entrusted on any junior player as it would be asking too much from him.

"Often on sub-continent tracks, if you send a junior guy, he might not get enough deliveries and get out scoring 10 or 15. Then again on a good strip he may just score around 35 and not get enough time to score a big fifty or an 80," Dhoni observed.

"After 15 matches, you will see that particular player's average in the range of 25 to 30. That's why you need to send them up and give them as many opportunities as possible. Look how Yuvraj Singh transformed his game batting at that position," he quipped.

Dhoni lauded young Ravindra Jadeja's effort as the all-rounder scored a quick 27 and then grabbed three wickets for 34 runs.

"Jadeja is an important player as he brings in a lot of stability to the side," Dhoni said.

This series has been billed as a 'revenge series' but Dhoni chose to play down the tag.

"I believe revenge is a very strong word. If you look at the England series especially the second half, we did play well. We scored runs but unfortunately there were rain interruptions and the ball used to become heavier and tougher for our bowlers to grip.

"This is a series where the idea is to groom the youngsters. Also this win came after a long time and it was an important win. You can't enjoy playing the game if you lose too many matches," the skipper said candidly.

About the new Powerplay rule, Dhoni said, "It was important for us to rotate the strike initially. There was a bit of uneven bounce but I won't say too much. The new Powerplay means that even if you take it in the 36th over, still you have 10 overs left. Therefore, you can't go all out.

"I reckon 250-260 would have been a good score and in the end we got 300."

Dhoni ruled out the idea that he would depend more on spin to counter the English batsmen as the visitors have found it uncomfortable.

"Had it been April or May when it's dry and humid with the pitches offering lot of turn, I would have said that I would go with three spinners and two seamers. But in these circumstances when we are approaching winter season, we still don't know whether there will be dew in Delhi and Mohali," he reasoned.