Line and Length - Times Online - WBLG: Thoughts on England v New Zealand day 1

Some thoughts on today's first day at Lord's:

Well the rain came but it went away by lunchtime, so those of us at Lord's got to see just over 50 overs as New Zealand reached 208 for six. At 104 for five, with 15 minutes still to go until tea, it looked as if my plea that Daniel Vettori shouldn't bat until the final session would be rebuffed, but Brendon McCullum and Jacob Oram put on 99 together. It may not have tilted the game New Zealand's way - although it's fair to say that New Zealand's tail ends at 6 and the batting begins at 7, so they may yet make it to 300 or more.

England bowled well but not brilliantly, I thought. The pace bowlers were controlled and hard to get away - until McCullum got in - but they lack an absolute snorter of a fast bowler. That's not to criticise, but against some very ordinary batting they did not need to do much to take wickets, just stick it in the right place. A huge amount of New Zealand's runs came through edges through, over or wide of the slips, with very few runs scored between extra cover and mid-wicket.

Poor Aaron Redmond on his Test debut. Great location, lousy weather. After twiddling his fingers nervously in the Pavilion for two hours, he came out to bat and was heading back five balls later, just failing to judge the movement from Anderson. Daniel Flynn, the other debutant, stayed around longer, hitting two decent fours, but also departed for a low score.

Ross Taylor deserves a bollocking from the coaches tonight. He was like a wound-up spring, always appearing on the verge of doing something silly. So often he charged off for singles without considering if the run was on - could this be the influence of the IPL? - and that very nearly did for James Marshall, who sent Taylor back, realised that his partner wasn't going back and set off very late himself. He would have been run out if Anderson's shy at the stumps hadn't been rushed.

In the morning as the covers were being removed we got to see the warm-up routines of the two sides. New Zealand kicked rugby balls and threw into baseball gloves but little else, while England went through a very elaborate series of routines, that seemed to involve bunny-jumps, dosie-dohs, press-ups and lunges. Probably the influence of their new fielding coach, Richard Halsall, who started just before this match. It seemed to work as the fielding was fairly impressive, although I bet KP was thinking "not the face, not the face" when he ducked beneath a ball hit hard at him by, I think, McCullum rather than catching it at gully.

Monty Panesar was only given four overs but made the crucial breakthrough, bowling McCullum on 97. A poor shot from McCullum who clearly thought he'd get his hundred out of the way quickly before building something impressive. Second time he's been out in the nineties at Lord's. We gave him a standing ovation when he walked off anyway, but would have been nice if he got to three figures.

Naturally Panesar went into his usual impression of a puppy on speed after taking the wicket, which remains endearing. Less so is his increasingly theatrical appeals for balls that are clearly missing the stumps or, in one case, hit the bat. Panesar clearly thinks that he should go down the Warne route of trying to con wickets out of umpires (either that or he has a very poor judgment of what leg-before is) but it is not worth doing. Warne was too good a bowler for such histrionics and so is Panesar. There is a fine line between ebullience and being a tosser, and he is in danger of crossing it.

Left the ground after the match to see ladies from Spearmint Rhino, the lap-dancing club, handing out flyers, which seemed counter-intuitive. As my friend Charles said to me: "Are middle-aged men clutching picnic baskets and umbrellas really their target audience?" Perhaps they thought that McCullum's run-a-ball innings had given some of the crowd the horn?

Oh well, tomorrow is another day. Sadly I won't be at Lord's but will instead by covering Essex v Kent at Chelmsford.