Cricket: England struggle as batsmen fail to take opportunity to find early form

England were battling to stay in contention for victory after a wicket-laden second day against the ICC Combined Associate and Affiliate XI at the GCA Ground.

The tourists lost six wickets for 52 runs – with Scotland spinner Majid Haq taking a wicket with his first ball – before surprisingly declaring 96 behind on a first-innings 185 for eight. But by the close Stuart Broad had taken his match haul to six wickets in the Combined XI’s 90 for five, leaving all outcomes feasible today.

On a day when expectations of attritional jockeying for position were confounded by the comings and goings of batsmen, only Alastair Cook (76) stayed for long. He appeared to have put his team in position to push for a first-innings lead on a lunchtime 98 for two. But that prospect evaporated as Kevin Pietersen, Ian Bell, Eoin Morgan, Cook, Steven Davies and finally Broad failed to cash in on what looked an obvious opportunity to prosper.

Cook fared by far the best in a 121-ball innings which contained 14 fours, but no one else could reach 20. Fast bowler Hamid Hassan suffered a nasty injury chasing to the boundary to try to cut off the four which brought up the opener’s 50 and will play no further part in the match.

England agreed Ireland spinner George Dockrell could replace Hassan for the second innings, after the Afghan seamer had pitched over a picket fence on the boundary and collided with concrete and metal runners around the sightscreen. He was eventually cleared of serious injury following a trip to hospital on a stretcher.

Before lunch there was was barely a hint of the collapse to come. The only alarm for Cook came when Boyd Rankin discomforted him with a well- directed short ball early in his innings. Soon afterwards Andrew Strauss pulled Hassan into the hands of square leg and Jonathan Trott had only a single when he got a faint edge down the leg-side to be caught behind.

A watchful Pietersen needed ten balls to get off the mark. He did so with a trademark four through midwicket but nibbled an outside edge off Rankin soon after lunch and Bell’s attempt to glide runs behind square off his Warwickshire team-mate resulted in another catch behind when the 6ft 9in Irishman found extra bounce.

Then Morgan edged a Mohammad Nabi off-break to slip, and Cook toppled over and poked the blade down leg to be caught behind off Christi Viljoen.

Haq then had his moment, trapping Davies lbw pushing forward, and Broad picked out silly mid-off when he timed a back-foot shot off Nabi. Graeme Swann and James Anderson avoided any more losses until, five minutes before the scheduled tea break, Strauss declared almost 100 runs in arrears. There was partial vindication when Broad and Anderson served up useful new-ball spells as the Combined XI were reduced to eight for three. But a stand of 40 between Scotland’s Kyle Coetzer and Mohammad Shahzad ended only when the former played on to Anderson.