England looking for sweet victory at Trent Bridge

Twelve of the 22 combatants from 2007 may square up again today in a match England hope will bear no resemblance to what took place four years ago.

Captain Andrew Strauss is adamant that, despite the significant crossover in personnel, his team have matured and will not succumb to the distractions which threw them off course last time.

As they did this year, England had dominated the first Test at Lord’s four years ago – but not closed out victory as they did so expertly on Monday – only to run into trouble and controversy in Nottingham.

A bad-tempered match escalated into ‘Jellygate’ headlines after chewy sweets mysteriously found their way from England pockets on to the pitch in front of tailend batsman Zaheer Khan.

He was not amused and responded with five second-innings wickets as England, already hustled out for under 200 first time round, lost convincingly.

Left-arm seamer Zaheer will not be renewing hostilities, having been ruled out yesterday after failing to recover from the hamstring injury he suffered at Lord’s.

But tearaway fast bowler Shantha Sreesanth, fined half his match fee four years ago after a series of intimidatory transgressions against England batsmen, may be back in place of Zaheer.

Strauss, in the ranks under captain Michael Vaughan last time, recalls the shock to England’s system.

He said of the 2007 Indians: “They showed their competitive spirit, and showed they weren’t in England to make up the numbers.

“I’m sure this side is very similar.

“I think we’re better prepared to put in another good performance, having won before.

“But we’re not taking anything for granted. They’re a very strong side – and they’ll come back strong.”

Strauss’s England will not be scattering sweets, or becoming embroiled in any other indiscretions.

“Like all these incidents, they’re little things that end up becoming big things,” he said. “But we’ve learned our lesson from that.

“I think the guys are more mature now – they understand their responsibility to the team and (they know) that silly little things aren’t helping the team win.

“The way we look at any Test match, everything we do has to be to help the team win.”

Specialist slip fielder Strauss witnessed events from close quarters.

His specific recollections may be hazy, but he is sure of one thing – that the situation will not be revisited under his captaincy.

“You don’t think about it – they were there, the batsman brushed them away and on you went,” he said.

“It was a silly little thing – and it won’t be repeated.”

Strauss has more pressing concerns as he seeks to ensure England stay on course to usurp India as the world’s No 1 Test team, by consolidating their opening victory in this four-match npower series.

Fast bowler Chris Tremlett looks likely to miss out with a hamstring “niggle”, Yorkshire’s Tim Bresnan a probable replacement, but a final decision will be made this morning. Middlesex’s Steven Finn was last night added to the England squad.

“We’ll only pick him if we’re 100 per cent he’ll get through the game,” said Strauss.

Whoever is tasked with trying to bowl out India twice for the second time in as many weeks, Strauss is under no illusions that success will not come easy.

“I think they’re going to come back hard at us,” he added. “Their record certainly backs that up.

“I’m expecting them to raise their performance, and we’ve got to raise our performance accordingly. We did a lot of things right at Lord’s. We had to work very hard for that victory – and we’ve got to be prepared to do all that hard work again.”

England (from): AJ Strauss (capt), AN Cook, IJL Trott, KP Pietersen, IR Bell, EJG Morgan, MJ Prior (wkt), TT Bresnan, SCJ Broad, GP Swann, JM Anderson, CT Tremlett, ST Finn.

India (from): MS Dhoni (capt, wkt), A Mukund, R Dravid, VVS Laxman, SR Tendulkar, SK Raina, Y Singh, H Singh, P Kumar, S Sreesanth, I Sharma, G Gambhir, M Patel.

Umpires: A Rauf (Pak) and M Erasmus (SA).

Third umpire: B Bowden (NZ).