The first surprise of the day came when England left out their spinner, Ashley Giles, and went for a five-prong seam attack. That felt like too much of a good thing, especially on a dry-looking pitch on which some cracks were visible even before the match started. But possibly Nasser Hussain suspected that most of his quick bowlers weren't going to bowl all that well on the helpful surface. Only Matthew Hoggard will be entirely happy with his first day's output. He slanted a perfect inswinger into Wasim Jaffer, then curved one away from Rahul Dravid in textbook style. Time after time the seam came out vertical, and rasped down the pitch upright. Unlike Hoggard, who is slightly embarrassed by his lofty placing, those watching began to realise why he's currently ranked fifth in the world on the PwC Ratings.

Late on, Craig White (who was only granted six overs) persuaded Virender Sehwag to miss one by a considerable distance - Sehwag looked as if he'd made 6 at the time, rather than a cracking 106. But Steve Harmison was rather erratic - his first four overs were maidens mainly because the batsmen would have had trouble reaching the ball - and Andy Flintoff rarely threatened. There was a distinct lack of variety, and you yearned for an over or two of spin to vary the diet.

And just when everyone was beginning to wonder what on earth Dominic Cork was doing back in the side, he came up with the prize wicket ... Tendulkar. It was probably the worst ball Cork bowled all day - a short, wide lollipop - but Sachin obligingly smashed it into his stumps. Don Bradman apparently recognised Tendulkar as similar in style to himself: he would certainly have recognised this way of getting out, because it mirrored The Don's demise (bowled by Bill Bowes for 0) in his first innings of the Bodyline series. Tendulkar looked disgusted as he walked off, contemplating a horrid shot. His team-mates will have been sympathetic - but the Indian media won't be quite so kind.

Cork has that priceless Bothamesque ability to conjure big wickets with balls that deserve to be smashed into the next county (remember him strangling Brian Lara for 152 at Trent Bridge in 1995?). Actually he might have had Tendulkar with a perfect awayswinger that somehow squeezed past the outside-edge, so maybe it was one-all. But Cork is lucky to be playing here, and this was a lucky wicket. By the end of the match Hussain might be ruing sending Giles packing.

Steven Lynch is database director of Wisden.com.

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