Yuvraj Singh scored 138 off 78 balls as India beat England by 158 runs in the first ODI. Photograph: Indranil Mukherjee/AFP/Getty Images

Kevin Pietersen must be wondering where it all went wrong. After England recorded a barely believable 4-0 victory over South Africa in his first full one-day series as captain, they have now been humbled by the Stanford Superstars in the Stanford Super Series, dismissed for less than 100 by the Mumbai Cricket Association and today, most embarrasingly of all, humiliated by a 158-run defeat in Rajkot in the first of seven one-day internationals with India.

In the process they conceded their highest-ever total in an ODI, 387-5, with Yuvraj Singh hitting an unbeaten 138 off 78 balls. Pietersen had won the toss but his decision to put India in could not have backfired more disastrously, as openers Virender Sehwag, 85 off 73, and Gautam Gambhir, 51 off 63, also contributed half-centuries.

“If you stand and watch an innings like Yuvraj played and Sehwag you have just got to take your hat off to the way they played,” Pietersen said after the defeat. “It’s an amazing batting pitch. You just need to touch it and it goes for four.”

That may be so, but England’s bowling figures make for miserable reading - Stuart Broad and Steve Harmison both bowled their full complement of 10 overs for 74 and 75 runs respectively, Paul Collingwood’s only over was dispatched for 15 runs, and Samit Patel disappeared for 78 runs from his nine overs. At least he could celebrate the belated wickets of Sehwag and Gambhir.

That was about all England did have to celebrate. Their reply stalled before it had barely even started, as Matt Prior edged a Munaf Patel delivery to Sehwag and the scoreless Owais Shah did likewise to a Zaheer Khan ball, before Andrew Flintoff was trapped lbw by Zaheer. Pietersen did his best to stem the bleeding with 63 runs at better than a run a ball while his partners continued to fall by the wayside, but all hope had already been lost by the time he was run out by Ishant Sharma.

The lower order showed more resolve than the recognised batsmen, and the runs of Patel (23), Ravi Bopara (54 not out) and Stuart Broad (26) took England past their revised target of 222, sparing them the shame of succumbing to their record one-day defeat.

Pietersen’s task now is to rally the troops before Monday’s second ODI. “We’ll sit down and see where we made a few mistakes,” he said. “But if a bloke (Yuvraj) plays like that you’re behind the game straight away. You’ve got to try to make sure you go over what you’ve done not so well and regroup. There’s six games left in the series and we want to bring some real good cricket to Indore.”

guardian.co.uk