India will be up against England in the first of the five-match IND vs ENG Test series 2025. This article provides details about England’s Playing 11 vs India for the first Test of the IND vs ENG series.
England Playing 11 vs India- 1st Test, India Tour of England 2025:
Openers: Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett
The hosts will go in with the tried and tested pair of Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett in the opening match against India, scheduled to take place at Headingley from Friday, (June 20).
The pair is coming on the back of a match-winning performance in the four-day Test against Zimbabwe last month and will look to keep up the good work.
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Crawley and Duckett have made a name as a partnership that is capable of giving England a quick start.
If we talk about the recent individual performances of both batters, both of them scored a century against Zimbabwe and added more than 200 runs for the first wicket.
Duckett, in particular, has been in magnificent form across formats as he carried his form from Test cricket into white ball formats against the West Indies and formed a solid partnership with Jamie Smith at the top of the order.
Zak Crawley, on the other hand, has been an all-or-nothing kind of player in the sense that if the right-hander gets going, he will score a big hundred; otherwise, it will be a string of low scores.
The batter would hope that he can get off to a good start in the first match, which will help him in the entire series.
Middle-order batsmen and all-rounders: Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Ben Stokes (c), Jamie Smith (wk), Chris Woakes
The opening pair will be followed by an experienced middle order with the likes of Joe Root, Harry Brook, Ben Stokes, and Jamie Smith, all of whom have been among runs in one format or another.
Joe Root, as always, is in rollicking form, having played a match-winning innings against West Indies in the second ODI, and will be itching to perform against India as well.
As far as the form of THE white-ball captain Harry Brook is concerned, the right-hander has a fantastic record in Test cricket and will look to add to his tally of runs.
The hosts bat deep with Ben Stokes and Jamie Smith coming at number six and seven respectively, and will be helped by all-rounder, Chris Woakes.
Bowlers: Brydon Carse, Shoaib Bashir, Josh Tongue
The hosts would hope for a spirited bowling performance in the absence of experienced bowlers like Mark Wood and Jofra Archer.
The onus will be on Chris Woakes and Brydon Carse to pick early wickets for the team and make things easy for the bowlers to follow.
Bowlers like Josh Tongue and Shoaib Bashir will also play a crucial role while bowling with the old ball.
The Englishmen, like they usually do, will go in with four bowlers, with Ben Stokes fulfilling the role of the fifth bowler.
Team news from Leeds ahead of a BIG week 📋
Ready to face @BCCI 👊
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) June 18, 2025
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