England in command

England vs India: 1st Test: Day 3 Lord's, England Report status: Stumps

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India will have to dig deep into their sack of great comebacks to create a turnaround and win, maybe draw, the first Test, with six sessions yet to be played.

With the lead climbing up to 450, England seem to have the match in their pocket, thanks to some astute captaincy by Nasser Hussain and disciplined bowling from his seamers.

England ended the day on 184 for 3, with Michael Vaughan scoring a skillful 81. He was well-supported by a half-century from John Crawley.

Morning session

India failed to translate their one-day batting exploits to the longer version of the game, losing the wickets of Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar in the first session of the third day.

Going into lunch, they were at 176 for 5, 311 runs behind England’s first innings total of 487.

England seamers provided a pertinent lesson to their opposite numbers in the Indian team with a riveting display of seam bowling on the third morning.

The Lord's track, labelled flat and bare, rapidly woke up to the English bowlers and cracked hopes of an Indian dawn. The Indian seamers will like to believe that the strip was altered overnight, but the bitter pill to swallow is that they let the Indian Test campaign down.

It was the ideal stage for Tendulkar to settle a score with the hallowed ground. He has managed just 68 runs on it, with a highest score of 31, in the two Tests he has played.

Simon Jones almost shocked Tendulkar, when he was yet to get off the mark, with a delivery that kept rising and nearly had him shouldering arms onto his stumps in the Welshman's second ball of the day. Raising his arms to the short delivery, Tendulkar saw the ball hit his elbow, bounce onto the pitch and trace a path over the stumps by a wafer-thin distance.

A raw fast bowling greenhorn suddenly seemed close to being a finished product. Bowling with an aggressive zeal, Jones had the two batsmen sniffing gunpowder in equal measure.

"People can expect more," he said at the end of day two. "I have been compared to Brett Lee and I know I can bowl as fast.

And he did hurl the ball at express speeds to inconvenience the batters, who were further agonized by some brilliant field placements by skipper Nasser Hussain.

Eschewing his flamboyant stroke-play, Tendulkar looked to get in and was troubled by Jones despite flashing some first-rate strokes through the covers.

Within the first hour of play he survived, thanks to Graham Thorpe failing to take a sharp chance at first slip. Jones had cut one across Tendulkar that took a thick edge and travelled to the slips where Thorpe missed the opening.

Celebrating the slice of luck, Tendulkar sent Flintoff crashing through the covers in the next over as India crossed 150.

Dravid, who was criticized for his slow batting yesterday, finally found the fence for the first time in the morning with the shot of the day. Going down on his knee, he sent Hoggard speeding to the cover fence.

Yesterday, with Sehwag going great guns, it made little sense for Dravid to follow suit. Sure enough Dravid batted like he was Madame Tussaud’s waxwork and failed to push the scoring rate like Sehwag did though he held one end up.

With a deck overcrowded with stroke-makers, starting from Sehwag down to Tendulkar, Ganguly and Laxman, it is imperative that there is some anchor to the Indian ship.

A snorter of a delivery from Hoggard that kept climbing after pitching off a good length took Dravid’s edge and sailed into Vaughan at point. Dravid’s 162-ball 46 had 136 dot balls and was by no means brilliant. But imagine if he would have gotten out and exposed Tendulkar and Ganguly at the fag-end of the second day to the England seamers. All morning Tendulkar struggled at the crease, beaten regularly by the English seamers, while Dravid played slowly yet held one end up.

More than blaming Dravid for drying up the runs, it would be interesting to ask Tendulkar why he failed to get going with his strokes, assured that the other end was secured.

Tendulkar, on a death wish all morning, swished at a delivery wide outside off-stump, got a snick and Stewart finished a regulation catch.

The Indian innings lay in tatters at 168 for 5. Tendulkar had scored 16 off 61 balls with two fours. With a few calculations, if Tendulkar had played the number of balls Dravid had he would have managed 42 runs; four short of what Dravid had scored when he was dismissed.

Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman saw India through to lunch at 176 for 5, battling to avoid the follow-on.

Post Lunch session

Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman were the last recognised pair as India hoped to get to the score of 288 to avoid the follow-on. But Ganguly pushed idly at his former Lancashire mate Flintoff and gave Vaughan his second catch at point.

All plans for a great fightback dissolved and the ghost of despairing batting collapses came gushing back. (177-6)

Chasing a rising delivery from Jones wide outside off-stump, diminutive keeper Ajay Ratra managed to get wood to the ball on its way to the keeper. Jones picked up his maiden Test wicket, though he could have had Tendulkar as his first. (191 for 7)

Agarkar walked in and got off the mark --- a feat in itself, given the fact that he had eight ducks from 17 Test innings before this one -- swished at Jones, outside off-stump, an Indian patent by now, and saw India’s innings racing towards its untimely end in Flintoff in the slips. (196-8)

Laxman, timing the ball as sweetly as only he can, caressed White for a couple of boundaries through mid-wicket and covers. India crossed 200 but were still 88 runs short of escaping the mercy-rule.

Kumble saw an inside-edge crash into his stumps for a duck and the new ball taken by Hussain had Zaheer offer a simple catch to Thorpe in the slips off Hoggard.

India were washed out for 221 runs, with Laxman marooned on 43.

The last five wickets fell for 44 runs, with only a 100-run partnership between Sehwag and Dravid. In comparison, England had a 100-run partnership and three fifty-run partnerships.

England led by 266 runs, and with seven sessions to play in the Test, decided not to enforce the follow-on.

Hussain’s decision to allow his bowlers some rest and not give the Indian batting another go on the flat track was an intelligent one.

Post Tea session

Even as the English openers walked out to bat again, the only figure on Hussain's mind must have been a target that would shut the door on the Indians.

India have chased the highest fourth innings total ever and that fact will surely be chronicled by the English think-tank, besides giving their bowlers enough time to dismiss the Indian batsmen.

Mark Butcher got the ball from Nehra to the fence in the first over of the innings and along with Vaughan found the fence regularly. While Zaheer kept the batsmen quiet at his end, Nehra wasted the new ball yet again, giving away 24 of the 28 runs on the board.

Ganguly rang in the first bowling change, bringing Kumble on in the ninth over. Butcher, in a moment of indecision, tried to sweep a full toss, missed and was hit on the back leg. Umpire Rudi Koertzen's finger had spoken despite Butcher suggesting he got some wood on the ball. The replays confirmed his plea, but England had lost its first wicket for 32.

Skipper Hussain flopped with an insipid innings, which was terminated by Agarkar. Hussain tried an uncanny cut shot to a delivery that continued to climb on him and feathered an edge off the bat as it settled in the wicketkeeper’s gloves. He managed only 12 as the England scorecard read 65 for 2.

The lead had stretched to 331 and India could only hope for an English collapse to have a sliver of hope in the game.

Agarkar, bending his back and having found the right patch on the wicket to pitch the ball, jammed one into Vaughan’s index finger.

Kumble forced another breakthrough when he had Thorpe scooping a slower delivery to Ganguly in the short cover position for 1.

Vaughan sped along with an innings that was a case study for any Test opening batsman. Playing an innings that embraced courage and skill in large measure, the Yorkshireman enthralled with his stroke-making but continued taking the singles. It was an invaluable piece of advice passed on to him by Australian Darren Lehmann -- his skipper at Yorkshire -- and has helped him score a steady pace. His innings of 81 had 26 singles and seven twos, besides the eight boundaries.

With the lead taking insurmountable proportions Crawley and Vaughan put together a 100-run partnership of 131 balls as the Indian fielding showed signs of weariness.

Crawley scored his second half-century of the Test -- for the first time in his Test career --- as England ended the day with a lead of 450.