IND vs ENG | We have got to be genuine to ourselves, says Joe Root ahead of Headingley Test

England captain Joe Root, ahead of the third Test at Headingley, beginning August 25, has said that his team has learnt its lesson after the 151-run defeat in the Lord's Test and will now avoid getting into "anything that's not honest" to them. 

In a virtual press conference, Root minced no words in admitting that as a captain, he could have approached to the situations differently. Notably, on the final day of the second Test, England failed to wrap up India's second innings despite getting the wicket of Rishabh Pant early. 

Mohammed Shami (56*) and Jasprit Bumrah (34*) partnered for 89 unbeaten runs for the ninth wicket to help the visitors set a 272-run target. With two sessions left in the match, England got bundled out for 120 to go down by 151 runs. Experts and cricket pundits have reckoned that England lost the grip on the match after getting into vengeance mode following the altercation between James Anderson and Jasprit Bumrah. 

“There's the theatre and everything else surrounding the game. We've got to make sure that we play the game how we want to play and we look after that as best as we can, and not get too distracted or drawn into anything that's not honest," said Root in the virtual pre-match media interaction.

"We've got to be genuine to ourselves, genuine to how we are as individuals and how we are collectively and be as good as we can, the way that we go. Virat's team will play how they play, I just want us to go out and be the best version of ourselves.

"We've done some good learning off the back of the last game I think we could have managed certain areas differently, me as the captain, we could have gone about things slightly differently.

"We have got three massive games to play in this series, there's a lot to play for. And you know we're desperate to bounce back strongly."

England have dropped their out of form opener Dom Sibley from the third Test and have recalled Dawid Malan into the squad. Malan, currently the number one ranked T20I batsman, played his last Test against the same opponents in August 2018.

"Dawid obviously offers a lot of experience in that top three, not necessarily in terms of experience in Test cricket, but he has played a huge amount of international cricket now, he's dealt with pressure situations,” said Root.

"He's played a lot of red ball cricket over the course of his career and he's also had great successes in a massive series in Australia and was our leading scorer out there, so we know that he's capable of big things."