As a man averaging in the mid-forties after 43 Test matches opening the innings for England, Alastair Cook can be very happy with the way things have gone for him. Nineteen fifties and nine hundreds are all part of the story, a story that seems destined to feature many more successes.

There was, however, an air of disappointment when he was dismissed yesterday, and for good reason. Fair enough, if any batsman were to be guaranteed 160 before he started an innings he would take it with alacrity. However, at the start of the day Cook’s sights must have been set on 200, as here was the perfect opportunity to get to that landmark for the first time in his first-class career.

He had done much of the hard work on day one, when by his own admission he was struggling for fluency. The way he played on that first day told us a lot about his desire to succeed and his hunger for runs. For a lot of batsmen, and I can remember feeling this at times, if things don’t click at the start of an innings it is not easy to just dig in, occupy the crease and wait for the fluency to come.

If you are battling with yourself it makes it harder to battle the opposition, too. Cook on Thursday took his time, took what opportunities he could and made sure he was there at the end of the day, by which time the mechanics of his batting looked much better oiled. There were boundary opportunities and some perfectly decent shots played to make them count. If you put together a sequence of his best shots you would not have known that in between there had been a degree of “ugly” batting. That is not meant as a slur. Not everyone is going to play like Barry Richards day in day out and if you end up with hundreds at the end of a sticky day in the middle, it bodes well for those days when all is sweetness and light from the start of an innings.

The issue yesterday was whether Cook would be able to go on and get to that double and it did not happen. There was no real change to his approach; once Edwards had finished his personal duel with James Anderson, there was Kevin Pietersen at the other end to keep the pace of the innings at a suitable level. This is how successful teams and partnerships work; each man plays to his strengths and between you, you do your best to achieve the right result.

It was all going nicely until that one little misjudgment scuppered the plan and while one can deservedly praise Sulieman Benn for his wily variation, the truth is that Cook undid himself. He attempted and succeeded with the same ploy several times before in this innings, working Benn onto the on side “with the spin”. But we all know Benn bowls a good arm ball, at which stage playing with the spin gets tricky and if you are not quite at the ball you can do what Cook did and skew a catch off the leading edge.

It was not a wild swish, just an error, and by now Cook will have got over the disappointment of missing out on the 200. He will know that it is within his compass to get there one day but that it will have to wait for now. The main fact is that it was a major contribution to a good overall team effort with the bat, albeit that any degree of difficulty was not that high on a placid pitch against mediocre opposition. Everybody knows there will be tougher days ahead this summer.

On a completely different matter, I have noted that the ICC’s Cricket Committee has been considering the feasibility of day/night Test cricket. I cannot think of anything more absurd from the point of view of players or spectators.

It is apparently the Australians who are keen to promote the idea and at least they have the right climate for such a thing. However, they have already trialled something of that nature in first class cricket and it did not work. There are immense problems with producing a ball that can both be seen and that can last the distance. Manufacturers say they can produce a white ball that could keep its colour but it would move around and the balance would be tipped heavily in favour of the bowler. Test cricket at its best? Probably not.

If it is a plan designed to attract more spectators then it is flawed. When crowds want to watch a Test match they will come. The ECB will have no trouble filling grounds for the Ashes. If the match does not have such appeal I can see no reason why spectators would want to pay £50 or more just to sit in a stand until nine o’clock when the prospect is that the experience could be a colder and even less attractive one. Nor can they look forward to a decent supper at the end of it all! For broadcasters the appeal might wear off all too quickly. It might serve to offer live Test cricket to an armchair evening audience but if the game is done and dusted in two days thanks to that all-singing, all-dancing white ball there are going to be some big gaps in the schedules. Bin it.