India have dropped Vaibhav Sooryavanshi for the fifth T20I against England to include Sanju Samson in the playing XI on July 11. After three ordinary outings with the bat, the team management decided to remove the 15-year-old from the starting XI in the last game of the series. Vaibhav had replaced Samson in the second game, with head coach Gautam Gambhir and captain Shreyas Iyer deciding to bench the Player of the Tournament.

However, English pacers targeted Sooryavanshi, and the batter had no answer to short-pitched bowling. Although he hit a few sixes, the returns were not impressive.

Former players and fans had turned against the decision-makers for not giving enough chances to Samson, who was one of the key players in India’s success in the global tournament. The right-handed batter played three consecutive match-winning innings against the West Indies, England, and New Zealand, respectively, in the World Cup. His failures in two matches against Ireland and one against England were enough for the think tank to omit him.

With Vaibhav not able to justify his place, there was no option left for the coach and skipper. They recalled Samson to the playing group in order to challenge England in the last outing of the shortest format’s bilateral assignment.

Meanwhile, Iyer won the toss and elected to bowl first, considering the performance of his bowlers and the good weather. “We are bowling first, considering how we bowled in the previous matches. I have told the players to enjoy and relax without thinking about the past results.

We have made two changes, with Suryansh Shedge coming in for Washington Sundar, while Samson is in for Sooryavanshi,” Shreyas Iyer said.

England skipper Harry Brook wanted to bat first. The host nation has dropped Rehan Ahmed to add Liam Dawson.

Playing XIs

England: 1 Phil Salt, 2 Jos Buttler (wk), 3 Harry Brook (capt), 4 Jacob Bethell, 5 Tom Banton, 6 Will Jacks, 7 Sam Curran, 8 Liam Dawson, 9 Jofra Archer, 10 Adil Rashid, 11 Josh Tongue

India: 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Sanju Samson (wk), 3 Ishan Kishan (wk), 4 Shreyas Iyer (capt), 5 Shivam Dube, 6 Tilak Varma, 7 Suryansh Shedge, 8 Axar Patel, 9 Prince Yadav, 10 Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna