West Indies vs England 2nd Test: Saqib Mahmood to debut as England, West Indies reset for second Test

In stark contrast to the pitches for their previous series in the Caribbean in 2019 when the hosts' fast bowlers dominated in Barbados and Antigua before Mark Wood led the charge for the tourists in claiming a consolation win in St Lucia, pacers look set for another tough workout over the next five days. With Wood sidelined by an elbow injury suffered during his first-Test exertions and Ollie Robinson still not recovered fully from back spasms experienced in the warm-up match, Saqib Mahmood gets a Test debut for England at the venue where he took a hammering in the T20 international series played between the teams seven weeks earlier.

That is the only change expected in a visiting side which sensed a chance of victory on the final afternoon of the first Test when the West Indies stumbled to 67 for four facing an unlikely victory target of 286, before Nkrumah Bonner and former captain Jason Holder defied their opponents for three hours to ensure a stalemate. "He's very mature for a guy who hasn't played a huge amount of international cricket," England captain Joe Root said of Mahmood on Tuesday. "He's been very impressive. He's got a slightly different trajectory and will give us a point of difference." Root also addressed the assertion by West Indies' T20 specialist Carlos Brathwaite that the touring captain was disrespectful in choosing to call off the victory effort only in the final scheduled over when there were fewer balls available than wickets needed. "I think it was slightly unfair to say that," he contended. "I don't think there was anything wrong with our approach at all. Given the opportunity to do it again we'd go about it the same way." Root pointed out that he had done the same thing against Australia at