Andrew Strauss has challenged England to "play positive cricket" as they try to claim their first victory of the winter in today's opening one-day international. The tourists have gone 13 international matches without success this winter, the most recent being their emphatic six-wicket Twenty20 defeat by West Indies in Trinidad on Sunday.

It has prompted suggestions England may become more conservative in their approach when the five-match, one-day series against West Indies gets under way at the Providence Stadium in Guyana today.

But Middlesex left-hander Strauss, who has overcome a hamstring injury to lead the team in his first one-day international for two years, is urging his side to set the tone with an aggressive, positive style of cricket.

"Generally, we have to play very positive cricket," he said. "You can't hope to live in international one-day cricket these days by playing a very conservative game - I don't think that works.

"At the same time, you have to have a caveat in place that the players have to assess the conditions. In some conditions, going out and smashing the ball everywhere is not the right thing to do.

"Even the Indians and the most aggressive teams in the world sometimes rein it back when the conditions don't allow them to go out hard. It is about cricketers having the ability to think on their feet and react well to the conditions and that's more crucial than any game plan you might have."

Strauss believes the squad he inherited following the axing of Kevin Pietersen as captain and Peter Moores as coach has been chosen more for this series in mind than the Twenty20 encounter several days ago.

They have been working for several days on their approach with team meetings and a middle practice session and now is the litmus test to determine whether they can perform with the same intensity.

"The Twenty20 defeat was a bitter pill to swallow as much as anything because of the way we played in that game - it wasn't the type of cricket we wanted to play on this tour," added Strauss.

"We did a pretty hard team fitness thing together, we had a middle practice and a couple of good meetings and there's a huge amount of pride and motivation for us to finish this tour on a high.

"If we can use all that positive feeling in the camp to create a good playing environment that's a great thing but it counts for nothing if we don't go out and perform on the day and that's something we all recognised and know we need to do."

England have ruled out all-rounder Andrew Flintoff, who is still recovering from his hip problem and is unlikely to return until the third game of the series in Barbados a week today.

They still have to decide whether to use uncapped Worcestershire wicketkeeper Steve Davies or the more experienced Matt Prior and have a choice between Steve Harmison and Amjad Khan in attack.

West Indies will make a late decision about captain Chris Gayle, who has been sidelined for a week with hamstring problems sustained in the final Test at Trinidad.

The 29-year-old all-rounder is keen not to jeopardise his participation later in the series and said: "I want to play but you have to make sure that you get fit properly.

"I'm looking forward to playing but at the same time I don't want to push it and cause more damage to myself.

"There is no rush to come back, the guys played magnificently in the last game, even when I'm not around these guys can step up and contribute."

If Gayle does not play, then Denesh Ramdin will again captain the side.