Mumbai, March 19:

England produced a solid performance to leave India at 89-3 chasing the tourists’ score of 400. Owais Shah (88) and Andrew Flintoff (50) both did well on the second day although Flintoff was dropped off successive balls from Munaf Patel.

England’s seamers were impressive when India batted and Matthew Hoggard removed both openers in a fiery spell. James Anderson then trapped Sachin Tendulkar.

The one blemish for England was the loss of five wickets either side of lunch, which resulted in a collapse from 326-3 to 356-8.

Paceman Sri Sreesanth triggered that demise for excellent figures of 4-70. But it was Patel (2-81) who looked the most impressive.

England began the day with Flintoff and Paul Collingwood both relatively new to the crease in a score of 272-3.

As soon as India took the new ball, Irfan Pathan extracted some exaggerated swing movement. Flintoff eased the pressure with a sumptuous hooked six off Pathan before Patel worked up a head of steam at the other end.

Collingwood was finding runs much harder to come by and when he edged a drive at Sreesanth, the edge was gratefully taken by Mahendra Dhoni. Flintoff had twice hit Kumble for four through the leg-side. But attempting a repeat, he holed out tamely to deep mid-wicket to fall for 50. The last two wickets yielded a precious 44 runs.

Tendulkar was in no frame of mind to end a worrying run of failure in Tests and he was the next man out when Anderson had him taken by Jones. At 28-3, India were gasping for a recovery and Dravid found a partner willing to play a few shots in Yuvraj Singh.

Yuvraj announced his arrival with a cover-drive for four off Anderson and some poor bowling from Udal allowed both batsmen to score freely. Dravid and Yuvraj cruised into the 30s with dreams of a big score on the third day.

SCOREBOARD

ENGLAND — 1st Innings (overnight: 272/3)

P Collingwood c Dhoni b Sreesanth 31

A Flintoff c Tendulkar b Kumble 50

G Jones c Kumble b Sreesanth 1

S Udal lbw b Patel 9

M Hoggard b Patel 0

J Anderson c Yuvraj b Harbhajan 15

M Panesar not out 3

Extras: 18 (b5, lb7, nb3, w3)

Total: 400

FoW: 1-52, 2-230, 3-242, 4-326, 5-328,

6-333, 7-356, 8-356, 9-385

India bowling: Pathan 17-4-64-0,

Sreesanth 22-5-70-4, Patel 29-4-81-2,

Kumble 39-7-84-1, Harbhajan 26.4-4-89-3

INDIA — 1st Innings

W Jaffer c Jones b Hoggard 11

V Sehwag c Shah b Hoggard 6

R Dravid not out 37

S Tendulkar c Jones b Anderson 1

Y Singh not out 32

Extras: 2 (nb2)

Total: 89/3

FoW: 1-9, 2-24, 3-28

England bowling: Hoggard 10-3-16-2,

Flintoff 10-4-13-0, Anderson 6-3-15-1,

Panesar 7-2-18-0, Udal 4-0-27-0