MANCHESTER, July 27: Blackpool pleasure beach, just up the road from Manchester, is famous for donkey rides and rollercoasters. On Pakistan's last tour of England in 2001 Waqar Younis took his team there for some relaxation.

On Thursday, there was no need to venture beyond Old Trafford to see anything of that sort as Pakistani batsmen flashed and fluffed their way to 119. There was too much witless defence, too little heart, and a touch of Afridi madness — but that was to be expected with him loitering without purpose at the bottom of the order.

Winning the toss turned into a nightmare for Inzamam-ul Haq. He is unlikely to see a quick end to the public debate about his decision to bat first on a hard, greenish track, under gloomy skies and a humid day. Forgive my meteorology but weren't those once known as ideal bowling conditions?

But you can imagine Pakistan's ambition to weather the new ball, rack up an imposing first innings total, and then turn the screws on England. Ian Botham predicted this was a good toss to lose. He turned out to be right, although that kind of thinking has always struck me as the logic of a coward.

What the Old Trafford pitch did expose was the gulf in technique between Pakistan's magic triumvirate of Younis Khan, Mohammad Younis, and Inzamam — we can forgive him one abject failure — and the rest of the batsmen.

Most of these fair-weather youths have grown fat on the plunder of lifeless pitches. They have indeed pulled Pakistan out of some desperate situations but those rescue missions have been in conditions that have offered little for bowlers.

Yesterday, a more testing examination questioned the quality of their defence. The same examination that is failed each time we tour Australia, and particularly at Perth. On this evidence we are no more ready.

Yet it would be wrong to simply blame the batsmen or Inzamam's decision. Steve Harmison bowled a perfect length for a deceitful pitch. Balls would rise like a tsunami wave or dive for cover. Test cricket was designed to be the ultimate challenge but never an unedifying lottery.

On days like these Harmison is England's Zinedine Zidane, head-butting the opposition to the ground, except his weapon of choice is a cricket ball and not his own skull — although I suspect he wouldn't do a bad job with his head either. He is also England's Curtly Ambrose, bandy legs and telescopic arms, banging short of a length and bouncing high, inspiring fear in his opponent.

Bob Woolmer's preparations for extravagant bounce missed an obvious point: it is one thing practising your defensive technique with marble slabs when you know each and every ball will rise at you, it is quite another when you don't know whether the ball will crack your nose or break your toes. Although the pitch, says Woolmer, isn't poor enough for Pakistan to complain about.

The bowling might be worth a complaint though. Mohammad Sami and Umar Gul needed to pursue a tight line and unsettle England but they were loose and wide, barely allowing themselves the luxury of creating any pressure on the Englishmen. They failed miserably to expose the devil in the pitch that Harmison had. One bad day does not necessarily lose a Test but another day of meaningless bowling will.

Welcome back to the Pakistan cricket rollercoaster. We have all been here before, and in a masochistic kind of way, many of us enjoy it. It is just the procession of donkeys that we are sick and tired of.

Scoreboard

PAKISTAN (1st Innings)

Kamran Akmal c Trescothick b Harmison 4

Imran Farhat c Pietersen b Harmison 0

Younis Khan c Collingwood b Harmison 44

Mohammad Yousuf c Jones b Panesar 38

Inzamam-ul-Haq c Pietersen b Harmison 0

Faisal Iqbal c Jones b Panesar 3

Abdul Razzaq b Harmison 9

Shahid Afridi c Pietersen b Panesar 15

Mohammad Sami c Strauss b Harmison 1

Umar Gul not out 1

Danish Kaneria run out 0

EXTRAS: (lb-2, w-2) 4

TOTAL (38.4 overs, 182 mins) 119

FALL OF WICKETS: 1-4, 2-9, 3-90, 4-90, 5-93, 6-93, 7-112, 8-113, 9-118

BOWLING : Hoggard 9-1-30-0; Harmison 13-7-19-6; Mahmood 6-1-33-0 (1w); Collingwood 3-0-14-0 (1w); Panesar 7.4-3-21-3

ENGLAND (1st Innings)

M E Trescothick c Akmal b Sami 5

A J Strauss c Akmal b Razzaq 42

A Cook not out 65

K Pietersen not out 38

EXTRAS: (b-8, lb-4, w-1, nb-5) 18

TOTAL (2 wkts, 49 oversins) 168

FALL OF WICKETS: 1-30, 2-95

TO BAT: P Collingwood, I Bell, G Jones, S Mahmood, M Hoggard, S Harmison, M Panesar

BOWLING: Sami 13-2-36-1 (1w); Gul 9-1-39-0 (2nb); Razzaq 8-2-23-1 (3nb); Kaneria 14-4-49-0; Afridi 5-0-9-0;

PAKISTAN WON TOSS

UMPIRES: S Bucknor (WIS), S J Taufel (AUS)

TV UMPIRE: Ian Gould (ENG)

MATCH REFEREE: Ranjan Madugalle (SRI)