England captain Eoin Morgan won the toss and elected to field in the third and deciding one-day international against India at Headingley on Tuesday.
England made one change to the side that won the second ODI by 86 runs on Saturday, with Hampshire batsman James Vince replacing Jason Roy after the opener suffered a finger injury while fielding at Lord’s.
Vince was listed to open, having last played an ODI in October 2016, but he has been in superb white-ball form for Hampshire this season, leading the south coast county to the domestic One-Day Cup title and scoring 171 in their semi-final win over Yorkshire.
India made three changes with paceman Bhuvneshwar Kumar fit following a back injury.
Kumar and Shardul Thakur replaced fellow seamers Umesh Yadav and Siddarth Kaul, with batsman Dinesh Karthik coming in for KL Rahul.
This three-match series was all square at 1-1 after India won the first ODI at Trent Bridge last week by eight wickets.
With five Yorkshire players — Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, David Willey, Liam Plunkett and Adil Rashid — in the England side for Tuesday’s match at the county’s Leeds headquarters, home captain Eoin Morgan had plenty of local knowledge to call upon at the toss.
“It’s a really good wicket — international wickets at Headingley have always been good to us in the past and we’re expecting the same for 100 overs today,” said Morgan.
“Vince comes in for Roy, he has been in fantastic form for Hampshire and he deserves his opportunity,” he added.
Meanwhile India captain Virat Kohli, also speaking at the toss, said: “We wanted to bat first.
“It looks like it (the pitch) will break up in the second half of the game. There’s not much grass on it and we expect the spinners to come into the game.”
India were bidding for their 10th successive bilateral ODI series win, with 2019 World Cup hosts England looking to treat Tuesday’s match as the kind of winner-takes-all knockout match they will hope to play during next year’s global showpiece event.
For all England are number one in the ODI rankings, doubts remain about their ability to win knockout games at this level.
England have never won the World Cup — the most recent of their three losing appearances in the final was back in 1992 — and their defeat by eventual champions Pakistan at Cardiff in the semi-finals of last year’s Champions Trophy was their 13th loss in 19 knockout fixtures in one-day tournaments, the worst record of any major country.
Teams
England: James Vince, Jonny Bairstow, Joe Root, Eoin Morgan (capt), Jos Buttler (wkt), Ben Stokes, Moeen Ali, David Willey, Liam Plunkett, Adil Rashid, Mark Wood
India: Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli (capt), Dinesh Karthik, MS Dhoni (wkt), Suresh Raina, Hardik Pandya, Shardul Thakur, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal
Umpires: Ruchira Palliyaguruge (SRI), Michael Gough (ENG)
TV umpire: Bruce Oxenford (AUS)
Match referee: David Boon (AUS)
