England 169-7: England left feeling green after India make hay on damp track

England may have lorded it at Lord's but they are in real trouble here after losing seven wickets on a rain- affected opening day of the second Test. It was England's bowlers who dominated in the drawn first Test, but it was India's who capitalised fully on the seamer-friendly conditions presented to them yesterday, reducing the hosts to 169 for 7 in the 55 overs that were available.

Batting was far from easy on a dampish green pitch and against a swinging ball and England's plight would have been worse had Sachin Tendulkar held on to a simple catch at slip. Chris Tremlett survived and he, following the late dismissal of Ian Bell for 31, must eke out as many runs as he can with England's lower order this morning if the team are to post a competitive total.

India's fast bowlers, supported by the gentle medium pace of Sourav Ganguly and the ever-reliant leg-spin of Anil Kumble, were excellent, pitching the ball up and bowling with intelligence. Rahul Dravid, the Indian captain, set excellent fields and his counterpart, Michael Vaughan, will need himself and his attack to show the same qualities today if this game is not to slip away from his side.

The one disappointment for England is that five batsmen played themselves in without going on to post a significant score. Alastair Cook was the pick of them, posting a battling 43 prior to falling lbw to Ganguly, while Paul Collingwood and Ian Bell each looked comfortable before playing over-ambitious shots. Matthew Prior batted for three- quarters of an hour too, only to be outfoxed by Kumble, edging a sharp catch to Dravid at slip.

Neither team's preparations for the Test were ideal, with the four-hour delay caused by heavy rain on Thursday allowing them their first outdoor practice in four days.

Yet the availability of such facilities did not appear to help either Andrew Strauss or Vaughan, who fell in the opening nine overs of England's innings. Zaheer Khan claimed both wickets in a testing spell of new ball bowling.

Strauss was dismissed in the third over of the day when he drove loosely at an away swinger from Zaheer and edged a simple catch to Tendulkar at first slip. The wicket provided India with just the start they were looking for.

Zaheer is an enigmatic bowler. There are occasions when the left-armer looks a world-beater and others when he is awful. One of his big strengths is his ability to move from over the wicket to round, and it was one such change in line that brought an end to Vaughan's campaign.

In an eventful over, the England captain was struck on the head by a bouncer before clipping the bowler nonchalantly through backward square-leg for four. Zaheer then changed his line of attack to go round the wicket, capturing his man with a clever away-swinger. Tendulkar once again took a comfortable catch at slip.

Kevin Pietersen walked out to a warm ovation, a welcome that suggested the Nottinghamshire public have finally forgiven him for the controversial and acrimonious way in which he left the county for Hampshire in 2004. In the three years Pietersen spent at Trent Bridge he would have played on a variety of pitches, but very few would have had as green a tinge to it as this one.

In the Eighties, when Richard Hadlee and Clive Rice were winning trophies for Nottinghamshire, pitches like this were the norm. At times they were so green that it was difficult to detect where on the square the game was to be played on the first morning.

Then, in the Nineties, it developed into a surface that batsmen dreamt of playing on, and recently it has provided an even contest between the bat and ball.

In weather like this it is almost impossible for a groundsman to prepare a good, flat batting track and the way that the ball darted about off the seam and in the air justified Rahul Dravid's decision to invite England to bat on winning the toss.

Pietersen glanced a couple of leg-side deliveries to the fine-leg boundary and crunched R P Singh beautifully down the ground for four, but the locals will have to wait a little longer for the former hero to produce a Test masterclass here.

On 13, R P Singh hit Pietersen in front with an inswinger. Television replays suggested that the ball may have gone over middle stump but Hawk-eye has been known to be wrong and it looked a pretty fair decision. The dismissal leaves Pietersen without a Test half-century in five innings at this venue and an average of 25.6.

If Pietersen was unfortunate Cook, on 19, was lucky, surviving a very good shout for lbw from the bowling of Sree Sreesanth. The ball swung back in to the left-hander and hit him on the roll of his right pad in front of middle stump, but the umpire Simon Taufel was unmoved.

With England's two most elegant batsmen gone graft was required, and Cook and Collingwood provided it by the shovelful. The pair applied themselves admirably, keeping out the good balls and picking up easy runs whenever the bowlers strayed. For India, this was far too often. Instead of showing patience and waiting for the pitch to misbehave Zaheer, Sreesanth and R P Singh got carried away and went searching for wickets.

In attempting to achieve the goal the trio sent down far too many half-volleys and short balls and control was lost, and by tea England had advanced to 94 for 3.

India regained control after the interval with the medium pace of Ganguly, who was hoping to repeat his feat at Lord's, when he dismissed Cook leg before. And the former Indian captain did just that, but not before Sreesanth had dismissed his partner.

Collingwood often thrives in tough conditions, which seem to bring out the very best in him. His technique, which was developed playing on the slow, seaming pitches of the North-east, certainly helps.

The 31-year-old avoids playing extravagant drives, preferring to keeps his hands close to his body and play the ball late, when under his nose.

And he did just this for 71 minutes before driving loosely at Sreesanth and edging the ball on to his middle stump.

Cook went three balls later when he played across the line of a Ganguly inswinger and was hit in front.

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