Outside edge... and four!

Brandon King sends another knick flying to the boundary - England have one slip in, had there been a second they might just have been in play.

King gets the West Indies off the mark from the following delivery, an inside edge running to backward square.

Lewis then pulls into the mid-wicket region and sees the ball hold up in a damp outfield - he can only run two.

It's time for debutant John Turner at the other end.

Archer finds some in-swing with his first delivery, King inside-edges while attempting the drive, with the ball falling safely.

The West Indies openers Brandon King and Evin Lewis are out in the middle, Jofra Archer has the ball in hand - we're almost ready to get going again.

Winviz reckons West Indies will win this - they also reckon England should have been 224-6 at the point they were bundled out for 209.

Image source, Winviz

You'll have seen that England have given debuts to four players in this match, with a number of players missing from this squad.

But which players haven't travelled to the Caribbean?

Well, with the Test side's series in Pakistan only finishing last week, the majority of the squad have returned to England rather move onto a white-ball assignment.

That means Harry Brook, Brydon Carse, Matty Potts, Jamie Smith, Gus Atkinson, Zak Crawley and Olly Stone weren't considered for the series, although Rehan Ahmed and Jordan Cox did join the ODI squad from the sub-continent.

Jos Buttler is still struggling with a calf injury, Jonny Bairstow, Joe Root, Ben Stokes, Chris Woakes and Mark Wood haven't featured since last year's World Cup, while Dawid Malan, Moeen Ali and David Willey have retired.

Aside from today's XI, Ahmed, Reece Topley, Saqib Mahmood and the uncapped pair of Michael Pepper and Jafer Chohan have also flown to Antigua.

A reminder, then.

The West Indies will be chasing 210 in Antigua after England were bowled out for 209 in 45.1 overs.

You'll have guessed anyway, but that's below par - the average score batting first on this ground is 243, and for winning sides it's 270.

Thanks, Mr A.

I'll confess I was beginning to write this game off.

But, to befit the date, it's now back from the dead.

Good news. The covers are off and the umpires have been out to take a look.

They have decided we're going to restart at 23:00 GMT. No overs have been lost.

My colleague Mike Peter will pick things up from here.

Image source, Getty Images

The umpires have been for a bit of a look around in North Sound, lifting the covers up for a bit of snoop to see how things look underneath.

Groundstaff did briedly start to pull the covers off, but then a bit more rain drifted over the ground and they promptly put them back on again.

Image source, Getty Images

A plan to invest £35m of government funding into grassroots cricket to help revive the game in state schools is said to be severely under threat

A source close to the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) has told BBC Sport the pledge made by former prime minister Rishi Sunak in April is susceptible to fiscal cuts.

The cash injection was to be delivered over the next five years with one of the major aims to improve access to cricket for those outside of private education.

The ECB has been told it will not find out the full extent of the cuts until next spring when departmental allocations are set, but government sources indicate they have been braced for a major funding setback.

Read the full story here...

You may, like Dave in Horsham, have spotted a small error in our post at 22:00. England did, in fact, lose a Test at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium in 2019.

A colleague put that in there as a test to see if everyone is awake in the rain break. Honestly.

England's XI senior one-day appearances (ODIs in brackets) prior to today:

• Phil Salt - 40 (24)
• Will Jacks - 34 (12)
• Jordan Cox - 4 (0)
• Jacob Bethell - 21 (5)
• Liam Livingstone - 85 (30)
• Sam Curran - 81 (32)
• Dan Mousley - 9 (0)
• Jamie Overton - 42 (0)
• Adil Rashid - 257 (140)
• Jofra Archer - 38 (24)
• John Turner - 17 (0)

Among the debutants, Jordan Cox hasn't played a one-day game since an England Lions tour of Sri Lanka in February last year, while Dan Mousley last turned out in the format in a match in Sri Lankan domestic cricket in November 2021.

Image source, Getty Images

The covers are still on in North Sound but the rain does appear to have relented a little.

As soon as we know what time play will restart we will let you know.

If you're searching for omens, England have a decent record at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium since it opened in 2006.

They are undefeated in four Tests, winning one, while they were victorious in their two T20Is at the ground, defeating Oman and Namibia at this year's World Cup.

They lost their first three ODIs at the ground before winning their next four. That took them into last December's series, where they took a loss and a win in a 2-1 series defeat.

Stumped

Image source, Getty Images

While we wait for the rain to relent in North Sound there's two big names from two remarkable stories in Test cricket on the Stumped podcast for you to listen to this week: New Zealand's Rachin Ravindra and Pakistan's Shan Masood.

Have a listen to the latest episode on BBC Sounds.

Postpublished at 21:56 Greenwich Mean Time 31 October

21:56 GMT 31 October

Unfortunately, there's puddles forming on the outfield in North Sound now. It looks like we might have a bit of a delay here.

Image source, Getty Images

There's another ODI going on right now involving one of the home nations. Scotland are playing USA in the ICC Men's Cricket World Cup League 2, which acts as a qualifying pathway for the next big tournament in 2027.

Scotland made 317-5 from their 50 overs in Dallas thanks to Brandon McMullen's 151 off 140 balls. USA are 188-5 off overs in reply.

You can keep an eye on the scorecard for that one here...

Daniel Norcross
Test Match Special commentator

The pitch is no belter, but a lot of wickets were given away by players reaching for 300+ when 260 might have been enough.

Image source, Getty Images

Some interval reading for you now, courtesy of Matthew Henry.

Matt's been looking at the dilemma facing Jos Buttler - and England - around the skipper's role in the team.

Can he continue to captain, open the batting and keep wicket?

Look at the stats, compare Buttler to other greats of the one-day game and hear the views of Sam Billings in the piece.

Andy Zaltzman
Statistician on Test Match Special

England are being bowled out way more often than they used to be - 20 of their last 38 ODI innings, since July 2022 (53%); from June 2015 to June 2022, they were bowled out in 25 out of 115 ODI innings (22%).