Morgan and Collingwood have taken control of this, Pietersen and Cook both need a score in the 2nd innings (if it gets that far) as they should be looking over their shoulders.

Cook does. KP is not under pressure, the selectors will carry him all summer (if they have to) to give him some time in the middle to regain his form as they know they need him to win the Ashes. Not so for Cook. With Bell, Trott and now Morgan having made test runs this summer and Strauss and Colly nailed on, Cook is the one who needs runs badly.

Yep, that's why I wrote "should be".

Asif runs through us for 354, Pakistan already 5/1 in reply.

Wouldn't be that surprised to see their second innings start today as well.

Cook seems to be one of those players who is a guaranteed selection irrespective of how badly he's playing (see also Paul Collingwood when he had a horror patch - was it two years ago at home?). The England selectors clearly see him as the successor/backup to Strauss as captain, so they're not going to dump him even if he doesn't look like he knows which end of the bat to hold.

You can only pick on past performance for so long before you have to start giving opportunities to players who are genuinely in form like Bopara and Adam Lyth.

48-6 at the moment.

Anderson and Finn ripping through them.

Well they steadied the ship a little and made it to 90/6 at tea.

I was asked if I wanted a ticket for Sunday last night, glad I said no now.

Interesting today very interesting

We're not covering ourselves in glory, and haven't since Pakistan were 47-6 batting, but we already have a 270 run lead which will be way too much for Pakistan to chase down based on anything we have seen from them.

Good, watchable, test cricket though.

If Pakistan could bat it could even have been a great series, however....