England vs India, 5th Test, Day 1: What went down
The fifth and final Test of the series started at the Kennington Oval, London under bright sunshine. It was a dead rubber but the crowd gathering and atmosphere at the ground did not make us realize that. Let's look at some of the major things sequentially that occurred on day 1.
#1 Hanuma Vihari makes debut
The big surprise came when the team management gave us a shock by selecting Hanuma Vihari in place of Hardik Pandya, overlooking Karun Nair. Nair had been with the team on the tour since the first test, but Vihari who joined the team after the three test matches was preferred ahead of him. Legendary Sunil Gavaskar who is a part of the expert panel for the broadcasters was visibly very upset by it.
Another surprise was India decided to go with the same opening combination given the dismal show by them. Dhawan and Rahul have been way short of runs in the series and so everyone was expecting for Prithvi Shaw to make his debut but it wasn't to be.
But as expected Ravindra Jadeja was picked in the playing 11 for the first time in the series in place of Ashwin. On the other hand, England went in with the same playing 11 from the last game.
#2 The Toss
It was very hard to believe to everyone that Virat Kohli lost the toss again. He might have conquered England with his bat but he was whitewashed in terms of toss by his counterpart Joe Root. On a sunny day at the Oval, Root decided to bat first on a pitch which looked a batting friendly one.