Selection in the spotlight as India search for spark at Edgbaston

India have won just one of their last nine Tests. You have to go back a decade to find a nine-Test sequence this barren. From Southampton 2014 to Galle 2015, India didn't win any of their nine Tests.

That period was one of transition. So is this one. Both have featured matches where India failed to capitalise on promising or even dominant positions. The 2014-15 sequence culminated in India losing a seemingly unlosable contest in Galle. The ninth Test of the current sequence was last week's loss of a seemingly unlosable Test at Headingley.

So many similarities.

But we're looking back at 2014-15 from a decade's distance, and we know what happened next. We know that India bounced back from 1-0 down, beat Sri Lanka 2-1, and began their most successful decade in Test cricket.

We're looking at 2024-25 while we're living through it. We don't know the next chapter of this story.

Whatever that chapter is, it will begin at Edgbaston. India have never won here, in eight previous attempts, the most recent of which was three years ago when they seemed on the cusp of a 3-1 series win only for fourth-innings centuries from Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow to drive England to a thrilling victory.

That Test was England's fourth win in their first four Tests under Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum. There have been bumps in the ride since then, but Bazball has built, along the way, a compelling body of evidence that this way of playing Test cricket puts oppositions under immense pressure, particularly when conditions suit the strengths of England's players.

It's instructive that England's most telling defeats in this era have come when their opponents have had control of the conditions, sometimes to the extent - as in Pakistan last year - of tweaking them to an extreme, out-of-character degree.

India cannot control the pitch or the weather at Edgbaston, and they cannot control the way the Dukes ball is made. They can, however, control their selection - at least to a large degree. Whether they include Jasprit Bumrah - who is expected to play only two of the four remaining Tests - and whether they are bold enough to forsake batting depth and pick Kuldeep Yadav, the other world-class wicket-taker in their squad, remain to be seen.

Kuldeep's introduction, at the cost of an allrounder, played a significant role in India turning things around after they went 1-0 down to Bazball at home. They put other considerations aside, and forced England to try their approach against India's best bowling combination.

The same sort of thinking underpinned much of India's success after that barren nine-Test run of 2014-15. After a similar run of results, what sort of thinking will the India of 2025 adopt?

England WWLWW (last five Tests, most recent first)
India LLLDL

Ben Stokes the bowler is back. Fitness concerns restricted him to a batting-only role during the tour of India last year, and that hampered England's balance severely on their way to a 4-1 defeat. He's bowled regularly since then, though, and has sent down at least 35 overs in two of his last three Tests - in Hamilton against New Zealand and at Headingley last week. Headingley was also his first five-wicket match haul since 2022. With the bat, though, Stokes showed signs of an issue that had dogged him right through last year's India tour: a seeming lack of trust in his defence against spin. His reverse-sweep-everything approach brought him a fluky 33 in the fourth innings, but it will also have given India an idea of what and how to bowl to him.

At Headingley, B Sai Sudharsan became the first India batter to make a men's Test debut with a sub-40 first-class average since another Tamil Nadu left-hander, WV Raman, in January 1988. He showed why the selectors had picked him despite that - and trusted him to bat at No. 3 - meeting the ball right under his eyes while scoring 30 in the second innings, but his dismissals in both innings to half-volleys on or outside leg stump showed he may still have work to do to hold his own against the planning and ruthlessness of Test-match attacks.

With Jofra Archer's long-awaited return to Test cricket deferred by at least one match, England have named an unchanged XI for Edgbaston.

England: 1 Zak Crawley, 2 Ben Duckett, 3 Ollie Pope, 4 Joe Root, 5 Harry Brook, 6 Ben Stokes (capt), 7 Jamie Smith (wk), 8 Chris Woakes, 9 Brydon Carse, 10 Josh Tongue, 11 Shoaib Bashir.

Shubman Gill was non-committal on India's selection in his pre-match press conference. Bumrah is "definitely available", but it's unclear if he'll play, and India will take a final call on their combination after having "a final look" at the conditions at Edgbaston. Gill felt India may have missed a second spinner in the second innings at Headingley, and indicated that they could pick one here, but did not say if it would be the wicket-taking wristspinner Kuldeep or the offspin-bowling allrounder Washington Sundar.

India (probable): 1 Yashasvi Jaiswal, 2 KL Rahul, 3 B Sai Sudharsan, 4 Shubman Gill (capt), 5 Rishabh Pant (wk), 6 Karun Nair, 7 Ravindra Jadeja, 8 Washington Sundar/Kuldeep Yadav, 9 Jasprit Bumrah/Arshdeep Singh/Akash Deep, 10 Mohammed Siraj, 11 Prasidh Krishna.

The series began at Headingley, where the team batting second won for the seventh Test match in a row. It now shifts to another bowl-first ground; the team batting second has won each of the last four Tests at Edgbaston - this includes England's win over India in 2022, when they pulled off their highest-ever successful chase.

The warm summer that the UK has enjoyed could potentially even things out a little for the team batting first - as it can be argued it did even at Headingley where India were on top at many points - with the dry look of the pitch prompting India to suggest they will most likely play two spinners.

For all that, though, this has not been a happy hunting ground for spinners in recent years. Of the seven English venues to have hosted Test cricket in this decade, Edgbaston has been the third-worst ground for spinners as well as fast bowlers, but while the quicks have averaged 30.00 here, spinners have taken their wickets at 44.45.

Will we have a full five days of Test cricket? Maybe, maybe not. The forecast for Birmingham has rain in it, particularly on days four and five.

"[India] always fight hard, come hard. Very passionate team. I think it's pretty clear that there's always pressure on the shoulders of international sportsmen. But playing for India, especially in cricket, there's probably a bit more of it than any other nation. So, yeah, look, very proud nation. Don't take anything for granted from last week. As I said, we start at 0-0 again. We tried to put in a performance there. Hopefully, we can put one in here that take us to 2-0 this week."
England are 1-0 up, but they start from scratch as far as their captain Ben Stokes is concerned

"In these conditions, the ball isn't swinging much after 30-40 overs. The wickets are also good for batting. If fast bowlers are not able to create too many chances, we feel a second spinner, on these kind of wickets, even if he doesn't create chances, he will at least help you contain runs until the second new ball is available. After the last match, I feel that if the wicket is going to be similar, a second spinner won't be a bad option."
Shubman Gill on why India could pick a second spinner