Key Points

In the series opener at Headingley, while Indian bowlers fell flat and tried to force breakthroughs with a toothless attack, batters took centre stage and led a valiant attack. India had five centurions in the five-wicket defeat in Leeds, featuring Yashasvi Jaiswal (101), Shubman Gill (147), KL Rahul (137) and Pant (134 and 118).

With the second Test of the five-match gruelling series on the horizon, Woakes expressed the excitement that comes while bowling against the explosive Pant, who is capable of putting the opposition bowlers on the back foot.

"Rishabh's a player who you don't really know what's coming next. He's a player who keeps you on your toes as a bowler, which is sometimes exciting to bowl against. But sometimes, he can put you on the back foot as a bowler. He makes the game move forward. It's exciting to be a part of the game when he's at the crease," Woakes told reporters in a press conference on Monday.

With the Pant threat looming yet again at Edgbaston, Woakes remains hopeful of pulling the curtains down early on the much-anticipated fireworks from the southpaw, along with other Indian stars, whom he refrained from mentioning.

"But look, he scored two hundreds, obviously up at Headingley, he played really well, chanced his arm on a few occasions and came off. Hopefully, this week, we can get him a little bit earlier. I think we haven't really met up yet, but I'm sure we'll have some discussions around some of the players that we came up against last week and how we can bowl at them a little bit better," he added.

Pant will hope to end his winless streak when he scores an away Test ton for India. The swashbuckling wicketkeeper is known to tantalise the Three Lions on English soil with his rollicking strokeplay. In 10 Tests, Pant has garnered 808 runs at a handsome average of 42.52 while striking at 69.89.

England Men's Test squad for 2nd Test: Ben Stokes (capt), Jofra Archer, Shoaib Bashir, Jacob Bethell, Harry Brook, Brydon Carse, Sam Cook, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Jamie Overton, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Jamie Smith, Josh Tongue, Chris Woakes.

India's squad: Shubman Gill (C), Rishabh Pant (VC & WK), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudharsan, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Karun Nair, Nitish Reddy, Ravindra Jadeja, Dhruv Jurel (WK), Washington Sundar, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohd. Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav.

- ANI