Gazeta Lodz - England opt to bowl in South Africa Test decider as rain falls

Overnight rain delayed the scheduled toss by 30 minutes, with the overcast conditions promising to assist England's quicks.

But soon after the toss had taken place there was a heavy downpour in London and the covers were brought on.

England had already named their side on Wednesday, giving a debut to Harry Brook after in-form batsman Jonny Bairstow was ruled out with a freak leg injury suffered playing golf.

The inclusion of Brook, who has scored 967 runs for Yorkshire in the County Championship this season at an average of 107, was the only change for England.

The home side hammered South Africa by an innings and 85 runs in the second Test at Old Trafford last month to level the three-match series at 1-1.

The Proteas, who won the first Test at Lord's by an innings and 12 runs, responded to their heavy defeat in Manchester by making four changes, two of them enforced.

It had already been confirmed that Ryan Rickelton would replace Rassie van der Dussen after the batsman was ruled out with a broken finger.

South Africa captain Dean Elgar said at the toss that paceman Lungi Ngidi had been sidelined by a hamstring niggle, with Wiaan Mulder coming in to the side.

Khaya Zondo was recalled in place of struggling batsman Aiden Markram and left-arm quick Marco Jansen returned after the Proteas decided against retaining second spinner Simon Harmer.

Victory would take South Africa back to the top of the World Test Championship table.

A win for England would give them a sparkling record of six wins in seven Tests under their new leadership pairing of Stokes and coach Brendon McCullum.

Teams

England: Zak Crawley, Alex Lees, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Ben Stokes (capt), Ben Foakes (wkt), Stuart Broad, Jack Leach, Ollie Robinson, James Anderson

South Africa: Dean Elgar (capt), Sarel Erwee, Keegan Petersen, Ryan Rickelton, Khaya Zondo, Kyle Verreynne (wkt), Wiaan Mulder, Marco Jansen, Keshav Maharaj, Kagiso Rabada, Anrich Nortje

Umpires: Nitin Menon (IND), Richard Kettleborough (ENG)

TV umpire: Chris Gaffaney (NZL)

Match referee: Ranjan Madugalle (SRI)

V.Lipinski--GL