Close England 297 for 9 (Ramprakash 105, Sarandeep Singh 5-98) A bookshop built into the back of the Lal Bahadur Shastri Stadium sells books with titles like Empowering the Oppressed: Grassroots Advocacy Movements in India. But today the oppressed waiting to be empowered were definitely English.

England's batting was subjected to 90 overs of Indian rope torture. Two Test-class spinners, in baking heat on a turning pitch. It was a day of getting in and then getting out, where periods of almost imperceptible scoring were interspersed with odd breaks for freedom by batsmen who stood, prodded and then occasionally lofted their way through their innings.

One man held England together - until a sprawling one-handed sweep eight balls before the end. The man who likes playing with the sun on his bat, and who despite his hundred in England's last Test is competing for his place in the side. Mark Ramprakash.

He was lucky. He should have been caught when on 45 and run out on 27 and sometimes he looked awkward - half back and half forward. But mostly he played as if he was in his front room, stroking his drives with the grace of a paid-up member of the corps de ballet.

His chief tormentors were Sarandeep Singh and Murali Kartik. Both have played Tests but are currently out of favour with Sourav Ganguly, so they were keen to lob a twirling reminder in his direction and that of the watching Indian selectors. The burgundy-pankadded Sarandeep is an offspinner, beguiling and with occasional suprising bounce. Kartik is a left-armer who bowls with a gentle loop like a man throwing oranges to his baby son, but whose fiery temperament has blotted his copy book in the past. But even Kartik, who doesn't normally do politic, admitted that Ramprakash played well.

Ramprakash was able to get to his hundred because of the wagging support of the tail. At one point, when Craig White was out at 149, it seemed England would struggle to make 200.

But James Foster hung around for an hour, and Martyn Ball, who had a great time against Sarandeep, for almost as long. Even Jimmy Ormond stuck it out for 29 minutes. It an adhesiveness that had been missing in England's early batting.

All eyes had been on Michael Vaughan, who was the one batsman to fail in the two-day game at Mumbai, but he tried an expansive drive at Sanjay Banger and was caught at slip for 22. Butcher, who was dropped twice by a butter-fingered Board side, got frustrated, charged and was caught at mid-off for 41 (104 for 2).

Nasser Hussain again looked in fine fettle from the first ball - driving to perfection and wriggling balls behind him with almost Jack Russell-like invention. But impatience got the better of him too. Shortly after Graham Thorpe was out, he tried to reach his fifty in style and, weight back, got an outside edge and sent a nice dolly to Rohan Gavaskar at point (139 for 4). Craig White, sweeping too early, got an inside edge to Sarandeep and was bowled for 0 (149 for 5). It was as awkward as his innings on Monday had been awesome and a reminder that England will have some tricky decisions to make about the top order - and only three innings left to make them.

Teams England 1 Mark Butcher, 2 Michael Vaughan, 3 Nasser Hussain (capt), 4 Graham Thorpe, 5 Mark Ramprakash, 6 Craig White, 7 James Foster (wk), 8 Martyn Ball, 9 Richard Dawson, 10 James Ormond, 11 Matthew Hoggard.

Board President's XI 1 Wasim Jaffer, 2 S Sriram, 3 Dinesh Mongia, 4 Jacob Martin (capt), 5 Rohan Gavaskar, 6 Pankaj Dharmani (wkt), 7 Sanjay Bangar, 8 Murali Kartik, 9 Sarandeep Singh, 10 Surendar Singh Bagal, 11 Tinu Yohannan.

Tanya Aldred, our assistant editor, is covering the whole tour for Wisden.com.

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