Bristol: The first of the five One-Day Internationals (ODI) between India and England to be played at the County Ground here Monday was cancelled due to heavy rain.
Rain began to fall before the start of play and the match was abandoned at 1:30 p.m., three hours after the scheduled start. The match was abandoned without a ball being bowled or even the toss taking place.
The second ODI will be held at Sophia Gardens in Cardiff Wednesday.
It has been raining heavily since Sunday night and chances are that the match could get curtailed.
Their morale battered by the Test series debacle, India would look to make a fresh beginning and salvage lost pride when they take on England in a five-match ODI cricket series starting here.
On one hand, the Indians will be distracted by the 1-3 series loss in the Test series prior and will want to do well in the ODIs, on the other, they will also need to balance their approach keeping next year's World Cup in mind.
That tournament, to be hosted by Australia and New Zealand, is now just six months away. From here onwards, every ODI played by the Indian team will be a preparatory step towards defending their 2011 crown Down Under.
And to do so, they will be evaluating players in the three ODI series between now and the World Cup here in England, at home against West Indies and then the tri-series on the Australian tour.
England Squad
AN Cook*, MM Ali, JM Anderson, GS Ballance, IR Bell, JC Buttler, ST Finn, HF Gurney, AD Hales, CJ Jordan, EJG Morgan, JE Root, BA Stokes, JC Tredwell, CR Woakes
India Squad
MS Dhoni*, V Kohli, R Ashwin, STR Binny, S Dhawan, RA Jadeja, DS Kulkarni, B Kumar, Mohammed Shami, AM Rahane, SK Raina, AT Rayudu, SV Samson†, KV Sharma, MM Sharma, RG Sharma, UT Yadav
