Cricket: India win toss, bat in second England Test

England pacers James Anderson and Stuart Broad gave their side the early breakthroughs to put India on the backfoot at 2 for 22 inside five overs in the second Test match of the series at Visakhapatnam today.

India lost KL Rahul in the second over when the batsman came forward to a ball from Broad he could have left alone, got an edge and was taken at third slip by Ben Stokes. Murali Vijay started aggressively and scored 20 from 21 with four boundaries. He was sent back by Anderson in the fifth over with a peach of a delivery. Short delivery on off, the Indian opener couldn’t get out of the line of the ball. The fielder at gully took an easy catch as the ball looped off the glove.

Earlier, India captain Virat Kohli won the toss and elected to bat against England led by Alastair Cook.

The hosts, who managed to pull off a hard-fought draw in the first of the five-Test series last week, have made two changes to their starting line-up for the first-ever Test at the Visakhapatnam ground.

Debutant off-spinner Jayant Yadav takes the place of Amit Mishra, while veteran opener Gautam Gambhir makes way for Lokesh Rahul, who sat out the previous three Tests with a hamstring injury.

England have included pace spearhead James Anderson in place of injured Chris Woakes.

Anderson, England's all-time leading Test wicket-taker with 463, returns to the field after being sidelined with a shoulder injury since August.

India: Virat Kohli (capt), Murali Vijay, Lokesh Rahul, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Wriddhiman Saha, Ravichandran Ashwin, Jayant Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Shami, Umesh Yadav

England: Alastair Cook (capt), Moeen Ali, Zafar Ansari, Jonny Bairstow, Stuart Broad, Ben Duckett, Haseeb Hameed, Adil Rashid, Joe Root, Ben Stokes, James Anderson

Umpires: Kumar Dharmasena (SRI) and Rod Tucker (AUS)

TV umpire: Chris Gaffaney (NZL)

Match referee: Ranjan Madugalle (SRI)