It's not just the Western Terrace that has changed at Headingley. That old seaming pitch, the one that Andy Caddick wanted to roll up and carry around with him after his four-wicket-over against West Indies two years ago, seems to have been rebuilt as well. A cursory look at a TV screen on which Ashley Giles was bowling, in bright sunlight, on the first day of a Test and you could be forgiven for thinking that this was Harare or Hyderabad rather than Headingley. Remembering that two-day demolition in 2000, England were delighted to bowl first. But they didn't make the most of the conditions. There was some swing at first, and the new ball jagged around, as Virender Sehwag found. But there was a lot of short stuff, Caddick had a day to moan about in his Sunday newspaper column, and Alex Tudor tended too pitch too short and too wide.

It might have been different, of course. Michael Vaughan grazed the stumps with a throw that would have run out Rahul Dravid, and later he missed with Sanjay Bangar gone for all money. You do wonder how England can spend all that time slinging a ball at a single stump in practice and yet so rarely hit all three of them in the heat of battle.

And Andy Flintoff dropped the sort of catch he'd routinely snaffle in his sleep. He was quite lucky that the ball flew harmlessly between his legs. He might have needed that hernia op a little sooner if it had been a bit higher.

Bangar's innings was one in the eye for those of us who thought that SS Das's 250 against Essex should have won him the opener's spot. It wasn't pretty, but Bangar moved solidly in behind the short balls - of which he received rather too many - and despatched a Caddick full-toss to the boundary shortly after receiving an earful of abuse for some perceived misdemeanour. By the time he was out for a battling 68 he and Dravid had broken India's long-standing second-wicket record in England - and broken some English hearts too.

Steven Lynch is database director of Wisden.com.

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