Pietersen Defends Aggressive Nature

Kevin Pietersen insists he will not change his aggressive batting style despite the manner of his dismissal which began England's collapse towards defeat in the first one-day international at Delhi yesterday.

The Hampshire batsman topped England's scorers with 46, but it was his dismissal - pulling a full toss from Yuvraj Singh straight to deep midwicket - which heralded the start of their decisive collapse.

"I'm not going to punish myself because I know I'm playing really well," said Pietersen. "It is not a good morning waking up knowing we should be one-up in the series. I'm not going to smash myself about as to the way I got out - I thought I was hitting the ball fantastically well.

"It was a full toss in a scoring area where I score a lot of runs for England and it was just unfortunate that I hit it down to a fielder - nine times out of 10 I would have hit it into row Z. We have a lot of senior players who are not around. I enjoyed the responsibility and the pressure and I have got myself off to a good start."

Stand-in captain Andrew Flintoff refused to criticise his team-mates, despite an inept batting performance which saw five England batsmen dismissed playing the sweep shot and leave the team trailing one-nil in the seven-match series. "The batters have all got different strengths and one-day cricket is about managing risk. We didn't manage it too well out there," he said. "The lads are hurting. It is an opportunity wasted but we have to re-group. The result hurts and so it should but we have got to look at the areas we can improve.

"It was an attainable score. We thought it might do a bit more than it did in the morning but the bowlers bowled well once again." The second match in the series takes place in Faridabad on Friday.