On a hard pitch, Graeme Smith chose to bat in the first ODI against India in Durban. India went in with three seamers while South Africa went in with four as the experts reckoned there could be some seam movement under the lights in the evening. South Africa left out leg spinner Imran Tahir and left-arm spinner Robin Peterson.

India have won only three matches and lost 16 against South Africa in South Africa - their worst record in any country. India left out Yusuf Pathan and brought in Rohit Sharma, who top scored in the Twenty20 game.

India: 1 Sachin Tendulkar, 2 M Vijay, 3 Virat Kohli, 4 Yuvraj Singh, 5 Suresh Raina, 6 Rohit Sharma, 7 MS Dhoni (capt & wk), 8 Harbhajan Singh, 9 Zaheer Khan, 10 Ashish Nehra, 11 Munaf Patel

South Africa: 1 Graeme Smith (capt), 2 Hashim Amla, 3 Colin Ingram, 4 AB de Villiers (wk), 5 JP Duminy, 6 David Miller, 7 Johan Botha, 8 Dale Steyn, 9 Wayne Parnell 10 Morne Morkel 11 Lonwabo Tsotsobe