Taylor past 50 and Oram finding his feet, 50 partnership now, ship steadied and with Flynn to come in next, hopefully big runs can be piled up.

202-4 With bad light, again

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Isn't it Vaughans home ground as well ?
As captain and the guy that gets the final say as to which end a bowler bowls from, should he take more of the blame for bowling Anderson from the wrong end if that was the case.
I saw a couple of Anderson overs in that first spell last night, I thought it may have had more reason to do with the pitch not being as quick as they anticipated it was, and that the length they had originally intended him to bowl at needed to be changed, which later I pressume it was.

This guy must be like a lightning rod, 4 bad overs all the England supporters jump off team Anderson, 4 good overs and the England supporters jump back on team Anderson.

Sounds like he is Englands version of the Sun, his popularity goes from daylight to darkness in the same day.

All this money in cricket and no lights at an international venue ?????

The black caps have shown tremendous fighting qualities both in the 1st test match and here at Old Trafford. On this pitch a score of anything in excess of 300 will put NZ in driver's seat.

The pitch offers some assistance to the bowlers and Vettori will be very difficult to handle in the 4th innings. The England batsmen are not in form anyway.

Well thats an absolute disgrace for a 21st century professional sporting team.

2 run outs a tradgedy for the Kiwi's 6/250

Oram (direct hit Cook) and Vettori (Panesar to Ambrose)

I never thought I'd see the day when Panesar would effect a runout.

New Zealand about 280 for 6 now, with Taylor and Mills going along very nicely. So far, that is.

I'd love to see it but the Rugby is on Fox

Congrats Ross Taylor for a well earned century I heard through BBC streaming on my CPU

Super knock from Ross Taylor, great valuable support from Mills too, 381 a very competitive 1st innings knock, puts big pressure on England now, especially with whoever winning this test match not being able to lose the series (big bonus for NZ)

O'Brien claimed to early scalp of Cook too, England currently 38-1.

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I don't know what Vaughan & Strauss are playing at. They need to win this game to give them some breathing space and Vaughan has 8* from 44 balls!

Saying that, Strauss was just dropped at slip off Vettori. McCullum and Taylor both spooned it.

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We can't have it all ways.

If we complain because they 'supposedly' throw their wickets away by attacking, rash or incorrectly selected shots, we can't complain when they 'dig in' and bat attritionally, grinding out runs.

You can have risky batting and fast run rate or safe batting and slow run rate - not both.

Add in that NZ are bowling reasonably well and applying pressure, now is a time they need to be defending - not attacking the bowling.

I read somewhere recently that the main difference to scoring runs in County Cricket and Test Cricket is that in County Cricket batsmen can usually count on getting at least one '4' ball per over, in Test Cricket you can't count on getting a '4' ball in your entire innings. This is why Test Class batsmen have to be able to score off 'good' balls or balls that in County Cricket would be left alone. This is also why scoring quickly in Test Cricket can be risky and also why Cricketers that are used to Test Cricket go back to the County game much better players.

Yet again it's Englands bowlers who have let them down, allowing New Zealand to post a total they should never have been allowed to get. They bowled poorly before lunch and the only two wickets they got were run outs. Look at their figures and this supposedly a wicket Panesar thrives on. Panesars poor figures are a direct result of him having to bowl on the first morning of the test - in conditions not conducive to spin.

A direct result of not having a 4th seam bowler change. Andersons figuures are the usual mix of rubbish and good, 4 wickets which is good but going for a lot of runs which is bad.

Just about every other commentator has been commenting on what a good move it was to bring Panesar on so early, and on how NZ struggled as the youngster varied his pace, got the ball up over the batsmen's eyeline and got balls to turn almost square. Will Luke's bulletin was expresed confusion over the delayed entry of Panesar this morning - the kid didn't get everything right, but Vaughan was certainly right to bowl him.

The seamers clearly struggled with the breeze today, but by and large (over the two days) the bowling has been looking very encouraging. Broad was generally acclaimed as the best of the bowlers on day one, with his lack of wickets not reflecting his decent efforts. He certainly seems to have made Oram's life pretty uncomfortable this morning. Anderson's still not convinced me, but clearly struggled for rhythm from his normal end yesterday morning before bowling one of his best ever spells from the other end when he returned in the afternoon. Sidebottom's still not at his best, but has bowled reasonably (and a lot better than he did at Lords).

Sure, the discipline could have been better, and the inexperience of the side was exposed as Taylor and Mills started tearing up the script... with the fielders showing signs of feeling the pressure and the bowlers then doing likewise. Not great... but Taylor deserves credit for creating that pressure it's only by getting through such sessions that players develop - so no great harm done (at least not if the side go on to contest the rest of the sessions reasonably well, which has certainly been the case with the bat today: 141/4 (55.6 ov) at the moment, with just 3 top order batsmen gone).

ps. England have at no stage needed a 5th bowler in this game. The weather meant the bowlers never had much to do yesterday... and had Vaughan wanted to do without Panesar he could easily have done so. For example, Anderson could easily have been introduced instead of Panesar, and had Sidebottom come back an over sooner, Broad would have been OK to come back at Anderson's end before lunch - and if Vaughan was convinced that Panesar should be bowling... having Tremlett available would not have changed much.