NOT A PRAYER!

Jos hits out but England are in need of a miracle

ENGLAND’S new era is already clinging on by its fingertips. Before a full house at Lord’s, and in the best conditions of the game, their top order produced a performance so dismal it is hard to imagine the top six will look the same come the second Test at Headingley.

To slip up after winning the toss and choosing to bat might — but should not — be dismissed as bad luck. To repeat the error two days later, as they collapsed from 91 for two to 110 for six, hints at something more profound.

Not until Jos Buttler and Dominic Bess, the two selection bolters, got stuck in after tea, did England look anything other than a team groping for the light switch in the dark.

Both made half-centuries — Buttler dealing with the lazy assumption that he needs red-ball form behind him to succeed in Test cricket, 20-year-old Bess revealing nous and gumption.

But the chances are their unbroken stand of 124 has merely delayed the inevitable, and the cheers that greeted the Bess cover-drive that ensured Pakistan would bat again were part relief, part gallows humour.

At home in May, England, who are in danger of becoming a team forever trading on promise and potential, expect better.

As it is, they reached the close on the third day on 235 for six, only 56 ahead, and hoping that the absence of Babar Azam with a broken arm will help foment panic when Pakistan embark on their runchase. And, well, cricket has seen greater miracles than this.

Until the fightback, no gesture had been more eloquent than the swish of the bat with which Joe Root greeted technology’s confirmation of his demise for 68.

That he had failed once more to convert a half-century into three figures was the least of his team’s problems. He would love it if his team-mates had the same problem. Put simply, too many of them have had a stinker.

Defeat in Australia and New Zealand was one thing. Defeat by Pakistan at home so early in the season would be unprecedented.

England went into this game having lost six of their previous nine Tests, and won only one — against West Indies.

It leaves coach Trevor Bayliss facing two, equally alarming, contrasts: with his own thrilling 50over side, and with Pakistan’s coach Mickey Arthur, whose energy and drive have dovetailed beautifully with a young, talented team.

Bayliss’s contract runs until the end of the 2019 summer, when England will host the World Cup and the Ashes. He is popular, and the England and Wales Cricket Board do not want to convey panic.

But 15 wins and 19 defeats since he took over is not good enough for a team of England’s resources.

Meanwhile, new national selector Ed Smith must consider whether to drop opener Mark Stoneman, who made a scratchy nine before being bowled by Shadab Khan.

Stoneman averages 27 in Test cricket, and looks shot.

Dawid Malan is also a worry. In Australia, he averaged 42. In England and New Zealand, he averages 20. Twice in this game he has failed to get forward; twice it has cost him.

Alastair Cook received a good one from the nagging Mohammad Abbas, while Bairstow — two balls after Malan’s removal — got a beauty from Mohammad Amir that swung in and hit the top of off.

Ben Stokes was dismissed for nine, caught at midwicket trying to shovel Shadab.

When Abbas pinned Root, England had lost four for 19 in 37 balls — and the captain had made his eighth 50 in eight Tests.

Faced with humiliation, England fought back. Buttler hit a trio of fours in an over from Hasan Ali.

Bess also hit out for an unbeaten 55 as the deficit narrowed.

Afterwards, Buttler hailed Test debutant Bess, saying: ‘Dom is a confident boy, a real scrapper and a fighter. He really showed that out there today.’

When asked how he approached his own innings, Buttler added: ‘I wanted to be busy.

‘Pakistan bowled very well all during this Test match and I just wanted to get off strike, get ones or twos where I could.’