Mandhana: 'Shafali deserves this comeback and I'm really excited to open with her again'

Smriti Mandhana vs Lauren Bell. It's a contest Bell, spearhead of England's seam-bowling attack, couldn't wait to get stuck into on the eve of the opening match of India's tour, the first of five T20Is at Trent Bridge on Saturday.

For Mandhana's part, she is looking forward to reprising her opening partnership with Shafali Verma, who is making a comeback - in this format at least - having fallen out of favour after India's group-stage exit at the T20 World Cup last October and lean ODI returns at home against New Zealand later that month.

Mandhana stood in for an unwell Harmanpreet Kaur at India's pre-match press conference on Friday but expected her captain to be fit to play the first match. She was full of praise for Shafali's efforts to earn her recall through the domestic circuit and the WPL, where she was the fourth-highest run-scorer with 304 runs at a strike rate of 152.76.

"She's had an amazing year," Smriti said of Shafali. "Once the setback had come, she went to domestic cricket, scored bucket-loads of runs and had an amazing WPL.

"No one had any doubts about her talent, the way she had come into the Indian team and dominated. She is a world-class player and always will be, but for her to go back and do what she did in the last year was amazing to watch. She deserves this comeback and I'm really excited to open with her again."

Shafali was the leading run-scorer in the Senior Women's One-Day Trophy (527 runs, 152.31 strike rate, 75.29 average) and the Senior Women's One-Day Challenger Trophy (414 runs, 145.26 strike rate, 82.80 average) - as captain of Haryana.

Mandhana and Shafali are second on the list for most partnership runs as an opening pair in women's T20Is with 2636 runs and a partnership run rate of 7.90.

Bell was keen to catch up with Mandhana, her Southern Brave team-mate in the Hundred, albeit on opposing sides.

"I'm looking forward to bowling at Smriti," Bell said. "I've obviously played with her, we've had a few net battles at the Brave before, so that'll be a good challenge, playing against her. It's exciting to be up against some of the best players and that normally brings the best out when you're playing against the best.

"The last time I played India, it's always been Smriti and Shafali opening the batting, so it's a challenge we've had before and one that is really exciting. They're both very talented and play differently, so I'm hoping it just brings the best out of us. As an England player, you really look forward to these series and thrive off the challenge and how good the opposition are."

Last summer, as England went unbeaten through their twin white-ball series against New Zealand, Bell was working on changes to her action, which is now more upright and allows her to swing the ball both ways. She is satisfied with where she's at but by no means feels that she is the finished article.

"In terms of that whole chapter, I'd say I've got into a really good place and I feel really, really happy," Bell said. "But I don't think you can ever say you're complete as a bowler.

"There's always stuff that I want to get better, but the big shift and the big change, I'm feeling in a really good place… hopefully we've moved on."

Bell was the leading wicket-taker during the T20I leg of West Indies' visit, which - like the ODI series - England swept 3-0, with seven wickets at an average of 9.72 and economy rate of 5.66.

Her series-best figures of 3-28 in the second T20I at Hove were eclipsed by fellow seamer Em Arlott, with a Player-of-the-Match-winning 3 for 14 having made her international debut just two days earlier in encouraging signs as England prepare for a tougher test from India.

"They'll pose us a few more challenges," Bell said. "We had people making debuts and some people playing different roles, so they can take a lot of confidence from that. It was a really good series to have first up in the summer."

Meanwhile, India have some new faces in their seam attack, handing maiden T20I call-ups to Kranti Goud and Sayali Satghare for a squad missing the experienced Renuka Singh and Pooja Vastrakar.

Mandhana said: "The WPL has been good in terms of finding new people and of course the domestic system as well, the amount of matches the girls play nowadays. All the girls have rich experience in the domestic format.

"I'm really excited to see them. Young talent, whenever they come in, it's always very exciting. Everyone's been prepping well and what better place than England to come in as a pacer? Of course, they'll take a lot of lessons out of it and I'm sure they'll do the job for the team."