England name replacements

Following the withdrawal from the forthcoming ODI series of Michael Vaughan, Simon Jones and Ashley Giles through injury, and of Marcus Trescothick for personal reasons, England have today named their replacements. Batsmen Owais Shah and Vikram Solanki will replace the captain and vice-captain, while Gareth Batty and Sajid Mahmood are like-for-like replacements for Giles and Jones.

Shah has followed his Test callup with a return to the ODI squad he was dropped from in 2003 – however, with 15 ODIs behind him he will be looking to prove that his omission these past three years has been erroneous. Solanki has been in and out of England’s one-day setup in recent years, filling almost every position in the batting order – but he found himself dropped in favour of Ian Bell when the original squad for this tour was named.

Batty and Mahmood have both enjoyed successful trips to the Caribbean with England ‘A’ in recent weeks, and although they will both be far from first-choice in their respective positions, both will be looking to build on their fledgling ODI careers. Batty has a total of six ODIs under his belt, whereas Mahmood has only one, a game in which he failed to impress, bowling seven overs for 56 wicketless runs.

England squad
Andrew Flintoff (captain), Kabir Ali, James Anderson, Gareth Batty, Ian Bell, Ian Blackwell, Paul Collingwood, Steve Harmison, Geraint Jones (wk), Sajid Mahmood, Kevin Pietersen, Liam Plunkett, Matthew Prior, Owais Shah, Vikram Solanki, Andrew Strauss