15 July 2006

England vs Pakistan (Day 3, 1st Test) - Lords, London - Saturday 15th July 2006

Another scorcher at Lords, for the third day of the first test against Pakistan - the only team apart from Australia that are higher than England in the world test rankings. Feeling like a sitting duck in 30 degree plus heat, I was also annoyed to have missed any sign of England batting whatsoever. Cook, Collingwood and Bell all hit centuries, with a huge 186 for Paul Collingwood. So, at the start of the day, Pakistan were 66-3, in reply to England's score of 528.

The suspicious may have claimed that if Bell could get a century, then so could Inzamam and Yousef. They would have been partly correct - a good batting wicket suited the Pakistani batsmen, and they stayed out all day. England's bowling has not exactly been penetrative enough this summer, so on a good batting wicket, against top class batsmen, it was always going to be difficult for the bowlers.

So, all in all a day that wasn't too interesting - England couldn't take wickets, and Pakistan just sat there building a total, reasonably slowly. The day finished 409-7 - so a whole day's cricket with less than 350 runs, and only 4 wickets. The first wicket was in the second over, and the last in the second last over - with not a lot else in between.

Still, a good chance to get a tan - a day sat in 30 degree heat makes you more tired than you realise. A very hard day at the cricket!

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