Lord's Test, Day 3
Saturday, July 27, 2002 That was our most disciplined performance in a long time – usually we manage it for a session or so, before the opposition take it away from us or we get lazy and sloppy. But today we stuck to certain plans, and for two sessions we were brilliant.

We found a bit of reverse-swing last night, and we kept it and worked on it today, which was important as we need a bit of sideways movement on this wicket – there's not a lot of help from the pitch just yet. But the key today was our discipline and the line we bowled – there's no point in getting reverse-swing unless you use it properly. It was a bit like Bangalore – the last time we bowled to such a plan – and with Simon Jones in the side it was an even less experienced line-up today. But to dismiss India for 220 was a great performance.

We weren't really tempted by the follow-on. With so much time left in the match, we didn't want to be the ones playing all the good cricket, only to find ourselves suddenly chasing 200 on a last-day wicket that was going up and down and taking a bit of spin. We've done all the hard work, and with two more days of sun forecast, the wicket can only get worse. The cracks will start to open out and who knows? It is a bit of a problem, though, as the ball gets older and starts to go soft. There really isn't a lot in the wicket and our bowlers have got a lot of hard work ahead of them. We need to get as much as we can out of it while it's still good.

I didn't have any instructions for our batters, other than to be positive. There's no point in coasting along at two an over, and the same goes for tomorrow. We have seven wickets in hand, and we should use them. It would be nice if one of Vaughan or Crawley gets a hundred, but we have to keep pushing along. There'll be 30-odd overs until lunch, so we'll have a look then …

Nasser Hussain was talking to Andrew Miller. His thoughts will appear on Wisden.com, other duties permitting, at the end of each day of England's international cricket this summer.

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