Toss West Indies chose to bowl against South Africa

Jason Holder won the toss and asked South Africa, led by JP Duminy for a change, to bat first in their World Cup 2019 warm-up game in Bristol.

No Faf du Plessis? "Mixing it up," explained Duminy, adding that the regular captain will come out to bat at some stage.

The grass cover on the pitch, Holder said, had encouraged him to bowl first. In his pitch report, Michael Holding pointed out that it's a hard pitch, and the patches of grass are close to the batsmen. The boundaries are not too far away, so the big-hitters might be in business.

Holder mentioned that Kemar Roach and Fabian Allen and "one more player" are sitting out this game, and 12 men will take part in the action for them in their "last chance to finalise combinations".

South Africa have been in form. They had a grand time against Sri Lanka in their warm-up fixture the other day in Cardiff, winning by 87 runs. Hashim Amla and Faf du Plessis hit half-centuries as they put up 338 for 7. Andile Phehlukwayo, who hit a 34-ball 35, also picked up four wickets, while Lungi Ngidi, returning from injury, conceded just 12 runs in six overs for two wickets.

South Africa's last ODI series was against the same opponents, Sri Lanka, at home in March, and they swept that 5-0. West Indies, meanwhile, had quite a different side when they played the tri-series in Ireland, where Bangladesh were the third team. They were up and down there, beating Ireland in both their fixtures, but losing to the higher-ranked Bangladesh twice in the round-robin stage and then in the final.

It is cloudy, and the weather forecast isn't too positive, but it has cleared up a bit, and while it's chilly, we should get a full game.

Squads
South Africa: JP Duminy (capt), Hashim Amla, Quinton de Kock (wk), Aiden Markram, Faf du Plessis, Rassie van der Dussen, David Miller, Andile Phehlukwayo, Dwayne Pretorius, Chris Morris, Kagiso Rabada.
West Indies: Jason Holder (capt), Andre Russell, Carlos Brathwaite, Darren Bravo, Sheldon Cottrell, Shannon Gabriel, Chris Gayle, Shimron Hetmyer, Shai Hope (wk), Evin Lewis, Ashley Nurse, Nicholas Pooran, Oshane Thomas.