England announce playing XI for 1st T20I against India, include 4 pacers; Buttler not to keep wickets

Jos Buttler will not be keeping the wickets and Phil Salt will be as England named their playing XI 30 hours prior to the T20I series opener against India in Kolkata. The series opener will mark the return for pacer Mark Wood, who was ruled out of the second half of the year since August.

Brendon McCullum has named his first XI in charge of the white-ball team for the T20I series opener against India in Kolkata. Jos Buttler, the captain, will continue to bat at No 3 with Phil Salt set to continue the duty behind the stumps and paceman Mark Wood has returned to the line-up for the first time since August last year. Wood suffered an elbow injury during the Manchester Test against Sri Lanka and was ruled out of action for the rest of the year.

Wood will form a four-pronged pace attack alongside Jofra Archer, all-rounder Jamie Overton and Gus Atkinson. Since the Test players have had a rest of over a month, most of the players will be fresh going into the series apart from the T20 globetrotters, who are coming from participation in various T20 leagues around the world.

Buttler had an 83 and a 38 in four innings he played on his return to cricket at a new batting position, No 3. Buttler will continue to bat at No 3 with the new vice-captain Harry Brook, Jacob Bethell and Liam Livingstone to follow. With a potentially destructive batting order till No 7, England can go ballistic at Eden Gardens on a good pitch with small boundaries.

Replacing Will Jacks at the top will be Ben Duckett, who has been in terrific touch across all formats. While Jacks did provide a part-time bowling option, England do have it covered with Livingstone and Bethell bowling some right-arm and left-arm spin, respectively.

The five-match series begins at Eden Gardens in Kolkata with Chennai, Rajkot, Pune and Mumbai set to host the remaining four matches. 

England playing XI for 1st T20I: Ben Duckett, Phil Salt (wk), Jos Buttler (c), Harry Brook (vc), Liam Livingstone, Jacob Bethell, Jamie Overton, Jofra Archer, Gus Atkinson, Adil Rashid, Mark Wood