By Tom Bason
October 15 2006

England once again struggled in the one-day format of cricket today, falling to a disappointing loss to India in their opening ICC Champions Trophy match. England, with Andrew Flintoff back in the line-up, lost the toss, and was put into bat by India captain Rahul Dravid.

Captain Andrew Strauss was desperate to get England off to a good start in this tournament, but those hopes were dashed after just 20 balls, as Dravid caught Ian Bell off Pathan for a miserly 4 runs.  Soon after, Flintoff, batting at number 3, was out lbw from Pathan.  Yardy and Strauss soon followed to leave England 27/4 after just 12 overs.  Kevin Pietersen tried to get England back on track, but could only add 27 to the scorecard, before being caught by Sachin Tendulkar from Patel’s bowling.  Paul Collingwood and Jamie Dalrymple staged a mini come-back, adding 49 to the total before Collingwood fell, as England’s top scorer with 38 from 74 balls.  The remaining 4 wickets fell for just 21 runs, with Dalrymple finishing on 24.

 

England came out after the turn-around needing to take 3 or 4 early wickets to give themselves any chance of getting something out of this fixture.  India’s first wicket fell in just the second over, Sehwag caught by Strauss off Harmison.  However, England failed to capitalise on this early break-through, and Tendulkar and Pathan put on 50 for the second wicket.  A couple of quick wickets, Pathan and Dravid both from the bowling of Jimmy Anderson gave England a glimmer of hope, but an excellent batting display by Yuvraj Singh guided India home with 4 wickets to spare.  Dalrymple was the pick of England’s bowlers, picking up 2 wickets for just 5 runs from 4 overs.  Mentions must also go to Steve Harmison and Anderson who also each picked up 2 wickets.

 

This is a disappointing start for England, who now really needs to beat both Australia and West Indies to have any chance of progressing to the semi-finals.