If ever Nasser Hussain wanted his luck with the toss to change, it was here at Edgbaston, where the side batting first has lost eight of the last ten Tests. So his relief when he got it right was palpable. Or rather, his relief when Sanath Jayasuriya got it wrong. Maybe that's a lesson for Nasser: be a perfect gentleman and let the other bloke do the calling all the time. Once England had made a double breakthrough on a helpful pitch it was important that they poured through the breach and made it count. For a while it was Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene who did the counting, against some wayward stuff from Alex Tudor and Andy Flintoff. It was as if neither had noticed that the Sri Lankans' footwork is always less assured when they are drawn forward by the well-pitched-up ball.

Andy Caddick briefly lost the plot too, perhaps remembering that he isn't supposed to bowl very well in the first innings. But then Sangakkara played the sort of shot you expect to see in a pick-up match on Regent's Park, and England were back in the hunt. And this time, with the ball being pitched up and Flintoff in sure-handed form at slip, they did make it stick.

The one-time score of 100 for 5 was about par for the course, and was much better for England's digestion than that Lord's feast of 555 for 8. And the showers, unwelcome though they were, gingered up the pitch and helped the bowlers rest and refocus. Hussain's field-placings – two gullies and a shortish point to Russel Arnold, who is wristy but inclined to flash square of the wicket - worked well, and England's bowling attack had a more balanced look, with Ashley Giles's stiff spinners getting an occasional airing.

This time it's Sri Lanka who face a struggle to stay alive after a first day to forget. Ironically they may end up missing Murali more at Lord's – where he would surely have winkled out England in a marathon second-innings spell – than here, where the pitch is softer and the turn is likely to be slower and more gentle. It's game on – the kind of game we expected at Lord's, but are getting at Edgbaston instead.

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