Jos Buttler endured a rocky start to life as England’s limited-overs captain after falling for a golden duck in his side’s humbling 50-run loss to India in the first of three Twenty20s.
Tasked with continuing England’s white-ball success following Eoin Morgan’s international retirement, Buttler began by having his leg stump knocked back at the outset of the reply to India’s 198-8.
England lurched to 33-4 before eventually subsiding to a sorry 148 all out from 19.3 overs, with the excellent Hardik Pandya following up his 51 from 30 deliveries with 4-33 at the Ageas Bowl.
There were cameos from Rohit Sharma (24 off 14), Deepak Hooda (33 off 17) and Suryakumar Yadav (39 off 19) in India’s innings, with Chris Jordan’s 2-23 going a long way to keeping the score below 200.
Jordan had a modest winter and particularly struggled at the death, but this was an impressive showing on an evening where England used seven bowlers, with Moeen Ali taking two wickets but leaking 26 in his two overs while fellow spinner Matt Parkinson and left-arm quick Tymal Mills were also expensive.
The total was always likely to challenge England, without Ben Stokes and Jonny Bairstow due to their test commitments, and they received a hammer blow as Buttler was taken out in the first over.
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