England leave India after one-dayers cancelled

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TESTING TIMES: The Indians celebrate during the recent Test series victory over Australia. (AFP)

The England squad are to fly home from India following Wednesday's terror attacks in Mumbai but the two-Test series with India will go ahead as planned, the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) said Thursday.

Meetings between officials and players at the squad's hotel in Bhubaneswar on Thursday led to the decision.

But the ECB stressed their current position was that the team would be back in India in time for the first Test in the western city of Ahmedabad on December 11.

Hugh Morris, the ECB's managing director for England cricket, said: "The Test matches are in place and unless we get security advice to the contrary, we will be playing those Test matches.

"Sadly we're in extraordinary times, and this won't be the normal build-up to a Test series.

"But the Test matches stand and we will be prepared to play them."

Explaining the decision to leave India now, Morris said: "We want to get back home to a home environment which we think will be a good thing for all the players.

"The players know this is a very real thing because they were only in one of the hotels attacked a few weeks ago."

Former England batsman Morris added no decision had been made about the exact date of the team's return, putting a question mark against the future of a three-day warm-up game in Baroda due to start on December 5.

"This is a tragic event and the players feel desperately sorry for all that are caught up in the events in Mumbai," said Morris.

The tourists have received an offer from the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to shift the second Test out of Mumbai, where more than 100 people were killed in co-ordinated attacks by armed militants.

BCCI vice-president Lalit Modi insisted he had no qualms about England's decision and confirmed the second Test would be moved out of Mumbai.

"There's no difference of opinion at all," he told reporters. "Hugh is absolutely right, the home environment will calm the players down. We are very, very happy the (England) players are going home and will be back.

"I want to reiterate, we are changing the second Test match. It will take place in another city, but definitely not Mumbai."

The second Test was due to start in Mumbai on December 19.

Earlier on Thursday, the BCCI postponed the last two one-dayers of a seven-match one-day series between India and England, and also postponed the cash-rich Twenty20 Champions League due to security fears.

The games in Guwahati on Saturday and New Delhi on December 2 held only academic interest with India already 5-0 up against Kevin Pietersen's men.

England were in Bhubaneswar because it is the city adjoining Cuttack, where the fifth one-dayer was played on Wednesday.

In a separate announcement Thursday, the ECB said England's performance squad, the back-up party to Pietersen's team, "will travel home immediately" from India.

"They were due to spend a period in Bangalore before they moved on to Mumbai," Morris said of a squad featuring ex-England captain Michael Vaughan and spinner Monty Panesar.

"Clearly that is not possible and they will return home in due course."

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