Cricket: England ease to win

England closed out a second straight warm-up victory as they fine tune preparations for the three-Test series against Pakistan in the United Arab Emirates.

England needed 52.3 of the 62 overs they gave themselves against a Pakistan Cricket Board XI, set 251 to win, before they emerged successful by 100 runs at the GCA ground. Jonathan Trott hit 93 and there were three wickets each for Graham Onions and Monty Panesar.

After Trott and Andrew Strauss (62) had set up the final day by taking their opening stand to 130, England made the third declaration of the match five minutes before lunch. They then made three strikes with the new ball but had to work hard for more inroads with spin and seam thereafter.

PCB were in trouble on 16 for three, thanks to Onions and Chris Tremlett. But Fawad Alam (51) and Usman Salahuddin dug in for a stand of 71. Onions took the first PCB wicket when Afaq Raheem chopped a ball on to his stumps and then Tremlett had Nasir Jamshed caught behind.

Mohammad Ayub Dogar was lbw pushing forward to Onions for a third-ball duck, but Alam and Salahuddin dug in.

It was not until more than an hour later that Salahuddin succumbed, caught at slip off Panesar. Once Alam departed, holing out to midwicket off Kevin Pietersen’s occasional off-spin, England were back on track.

Haris Sohail was lbw pushing half-forward to Graeme Swann – and although there was a suspicion of bat before pad when Onions trapped Yasir Shah in front, there was no doubt about the stumping after Raza Hasan went on an odd walkabout to Panesar.

The slow left-armer completed proceedings when he had Mohammad Talha last out, lbw playing no shot.