Adelaide Test, Day 1
Thursday, November 21, 2002 That was a very good day for England, although it was a real shame for them about that last wicket. That pulled it back to about 55-45 to England – it was a huge wicket for Australia, as England would obviously have loved to go in only three down on what is a fantastic batting track. It's put the match back almost on an even keel now and the first hour tomorrow will be vital.

Michael Vaughan was great today – that's probably the best English innings I've ever seen. He was very organised, and powerful when he needed to be. I liked the way he was looking for runs all the time – searching for singles even though he had tweaked his knee before the match. It was an amazing innings really, considering that the rumour we got in the media centre originally was that he was a no-show to play, and that Alec Stewart was lined up to open.

Yes, Vaughan had a few escapes, the main one being that catch to Justin Langer when he had 19. The third umpire gave the right decision, because he couldn't tell for sure whether it had been caught cleanly. Everyone up in the commentary box thought it was out, though.

This has happened time and time again, so the players can't whinge about it. It's going to keep happening unless you take the third umpire out of the process – or give him the power to refer the decision back to the field umpires. At the moment the guys on the field are scared that any decision they do make could be shown up as wrong, but if they're told that won't happen they could go with their gut. For this one Steve Bucknor could have asked Justin Langer if he'd caught it – if he'd said yes and later a close-up had shown that it didn't carry or wasn't a legitimate catch then Langer's got the can to carry.

The Australians dropped a few other catches as well, and although I thought the bowlers stuck at it very efficiently all day you have to say they were poor in the field. Their catching in the first innings of matches recently has been very bad. It might be complacency, or a bit of laziness in the practices – I don't know. But when it really mattered, in the second innings at Brisbane, they were keenly focussed and caught everything, and I expect them to tighten things up again here.

Stewart is the key tomorrow – first the Australians will try to nip him out with the new ball, then Shane Warne will get on quite quickly. But if Alec can get through that England could be set, because Mark Butcher looked in great form. If they get a partnership together England could be looking at 450-plus – but Australia will know that two or three wickets in that first hour will put them back on top.

Ian Healy, who kept wicket for Australia in six winning Ashes series, will be providing his Expert View at the end of each day's play in the Tests. He was talking to Steven Lynch.

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