England vs Bangladesh, 1st Match, Group A - Live Cricket Score, Commentary

Team walk out for the national anthems. Some fireworks follow. We're all set for the first ball of the Champions Trophy 2017.

Playing XIs

England: Jason Roy, Alex Hales, Joe Root, Eoin Morgan (c), Ben Stokes, Jos Buttler (wk), Moeen Ali, Chris Woakes, Liam Plunkett, Mark Wood, Jake Ball

Bangladesh: Tamim Iqbal, Soumya Sarkar, Imrul Kayes, Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), Sabbir Rahman, Mahmudullah, Mosaddek Hossain Saikat, Mashrafe Mortaza (c), Mustafizur Rahman, Rubel Hossain

Toss

England have won the toss and elected to field first. Jake Ball comes in ahead of Adil Rashid for the hosts. Mortaza says they would have liked bowled too. So, England are going with four seamers and Morgan says "conditions and opposition dictated that."

Mild concerns:

Even though they are expected to win, England will keep a close eye on Ben Stokes and Jason Roy for different reasons. Stokes, who had an outstanding debut season in the IPL, has been struggling with his knee that has hampered him from bowling his full quota of overs. He was rested for the third and final ODI against South Africa and England are confident that their premium allrounder will be at his best with the ball as well in the tournament. Roy has been under pressure to perform after scoring just one half-century in his last 12 innings. With Bairstow being amongst the runs, he will be feeling the heat today even though Morgan has backed the opener.

Build up:

All the talk about the relevance of the Champions Trophy can be put to rest as England and Bangladesh are set to kick off the eighth edition at the Oval. The hosts will start the contest as overwhelming favourites despite Bangladesh's rise in the One-day format in recent times. In fact, many have marked them as the favourites to clinch the title. They perhaps have the most powerful, most intimidating batting line up among all the eight teams following their rapid transformation post the 2015 World Cup debacle.

And it was Bangladesh who handed them the morale-destroying loss in Australia to knock them out of the tournament. Times have changed and on a surface that is expected to be batting friendly, the hosts' batting might is expected to be on full display in the tournament opener.

yaDjrLz66dv