TRENT BRIDGE, 1 September 2004 — With their morale at a low ebb after recent poor performances, India embark on yet another one-day cricket series when they clash with England in the NatWest Challenge here today.

Skipper Saurav Ganguly put up a brave face as he spoke to reporters on the eve of the match.

“We have had a good run over the last two years when we did well all over the world. The mindset is that we should not worry too much about the recent poor shows and get inspiration from those performances and try to do well in the future,” Ganguly said.

He said England have done well in the past in Test matches but not in one-dayers. “We have to play well and win. We are familiar with all English players. I personally have been watching a lot of their matches on television,” he added.

Ganguly said the team will stick to the seven-batsmen policy in the near future. “We will play another batsman in place of Sachin who is out of the series. There is no reason to play a specialist batsman when Rahul has done well behind the stumps,” he added.

Ganguly lamented the fact that the country has failed to produce a good all-rounder in the immediate past. “We don’t have a top class all-rounder in domestic cricket. This is one area of worry. We have Sehwag and Tendulkar who are batsmen but have bowled well in the past,” Ganguly added.

He said the team management had not decided whether to play three seamers or two spinners. “We will decide tomorrow after having a look at the wicket,” he said.

He had a lot of expectations from young fast bowlers Irfan Pathan and Lakshmipati Balaji. “They are both young and on their first tour of England. The conditions here should help them to swing the ball much more and I hope that they will do well,” Ganguly said.

The absence of Tendulkar means Rohan Gavaskar is likely to be included in the final 11. Ashish Nehra may get preference over Ajit Agarkar to constitute the pace trio with Irfan and Balaji. And it will be either off-spinner Harbhajan Singh or Anil Kumble, the leg-spinner who will be included.

The Trent Bridge wicket has a history of producing big scores and today’s match is unlikely to be different.

England skipper Michael Vaughan said his team was looking forward to a tough challenge and a good series against India. “We have to build up on our success early in the season and the boys are in good shape and spirit,” he said.

Vaughan agreed that at times the support for the Indians was so much that he felt he was playing abroad. “But that does not matter. It just puts some extra pressure on us and that is good for the team,” Vaughan added. Vaughan said the Indians were going to be tough opponents even without Tendulkar. “I am sure they will field another top class batsman in place of Tendulkar as they have a lot of talent,” Vaughan added.

The only time the Indians have played England at Trent Bridge was in 1990 when India led by Mohammed Azharuddin won by five wickets. Azhar was India’s top scorer with 63 runs.

The Indians will be eager to get back to winning ways after their poor showing and at Trent Bridge they can draw some inspiration from history books.