India vs England: Eoin Morgan, Sam Billings ruled out of last two ODIs due to injuries; Jos Buttler to lead

Pune, March 25: In a big jolt to England ahead of the second ODI against India, England captain Eoin Morgan and batsman Sam Billings have been ruled out of the last two matches due to injuries. Both Morgan and Billings suffered injuries in the first ODI on Tuesday (March 23) in Pune.

While fielding in the first ODI, Morgan had split the webbing between his right thumb and index finger. The skipper needed four stitches before walking into the middle to bat in England's run chase of 318, which they ended up losing by 66 runs. The left-handed batsman scored 22 as England were bowled out for 251.

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Billings, who sprained his collar bone as he dived in vain to stop a boundary, was also able to bat and contributed 18. But on the eve of the second ODI, it was announced that both Morgan and Billings were out of the final two ODIs.

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In Morgan's absence, Jos Buttler will be captaining the side while opener Liam Livingstone will be making his ODI debut. England's top-order batsman Dawid Malan has been drafted into the squad as a backup batsman and is available for selection.

Morgan went through a fielding drill at the start of training at the MCA Stadium on Thursday (March 25) and afterwards declared himself unfit.

Morgan said: "I had the hand re-dressed before the start of training today but it quickly became apparent that I found myself protecting the injury and getting into the wrong positions to catch the ball.

"There's nowhere to hide on the field in international cricket these days, especially in limited-over formats so it didn't require any great thought to make myself unavailable.

"It was a freak injury and it's extremely frustrating but there's nothing I can do about it. It's now just a case of letting the cut heal. I have every confidence in Jos and the rest of the squad coping without me."

Billings, on the other hand, did not train after he suffered a bruised left collar bone and the injury remained sore on Thursday.