sport news PAUL NEWMAN: How England could do with a Trent Bridge special from Jimmy ...

sport news PAUL NEWMAN: How England could do with a Trent Bridge special from Jimmy ...
sport news PAUL NEWMAN: How England could do with a Trent Bridge special from Jimmy ...

England were meant to be gaining momentum now, rest and rotation behind them, in their grand plan to peak in time for this winter’s Ashes. It has not quite worked out that way.

Instead they go into the first Test of their marquee series against India at Trent Bridge on Wednesday closer to square one than the crowning moment of Joe Root’s captaincy.

This could even be the beginning of the end for Root if defeats in India last winter and against New Zealand earlier this summer are followed by another fragile display here.

Joe Root and Chris Silverwood look on ahead of England's first Test match against India

Joe Root and Chris Silverwood look on ahead of England's first Test match against India 

The England captain bumps fists with India skipper Virat Kohli at Trent Bridge in Nottingham

The England captain bumps fists with India skipper Virat Kohli at Trent Bridge in Nottingham 

Certainly it is rare for India, who have not won a series in England since 2007 and the jelly-bean affair, to start off as favourites against an England team usually so formidable on the green grass of home.

But Virat Kohli knows this will be the best chance he will ever have of claiming the scalp of England here to add to that of Australia won earlier this year by his team largely without him.

It is India who are by far the better prepared team, having spent three weeks on holiday in England after their World Test Championship final defeat by New Zealand and then the last three preparing quietly in Durham.

The bulk of England’s players, in contrast, have barely played at all for weeks, certainly not with a red-ball after the ECB’s ill-considered decision to throw all its eggs this peak summer into a Hundred shaped basket.

Root and Chris Silverwood, who have been trying to build towards these next 10 Tests against India and Australia ever since they came together after the last Ashes in 2019, have certainly been unlucky.

The pandemic and injuries have thrown their best laid plans into confusion, culminating in the withdrawal of the man on who so much depended in Ben Stokes.

And that has left England looking vulnerable and brittle, particularly in their batting, on the return on Wednesday of ‘real’ cricket after such a frustrating and artificial summer.

Not that there seemed much of a sense of anticipation at Trent Bridge on Tuesday. It all seemed strangely downbeat, with Root having taken the unusual step of speaking to the media a day early and India not even bothering to train a day out from the match. This huge series all seems like an after-thought rather than the most important – and lucrative - show in cricket.

Root admitted last week it was hard to see Ben Stokes suffering with his mental health

Root admitted last week it was hard to see Ben Stokes suffering with his mental health

Jimmy Anderson, stepping into the England captain’s media shoes, acknowledged how unusual and almost surreal the

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