ENGLAND moved, edgily at first but later with a swagger, towards a commanding position in the second Test yesterday and are poised to push for an historic victory today or tomorrow. There is still much work to be done, as 10 more Australian wickets will not come easily on a good batting surface, but before the game England would have given much to be in this situation.

A mighty effort is required with the ball, and the fact that England have not beaten Australia on this ground for 75 years will not make things easier. It is six years since England have won any Ashes Test without fumbling painfully over the last rites. It would be no surprise were they to be pushed hard again.

There are theoretically 198 overs left in the game. Three years ago, England, having enforced the follow-on, were unable to dismiss Sri Lanka in 199 overs. So a draw may yet be the outcome.

But there are signs of demoralisation among the Australians. There were fielding errors from Ricky Ponting and Ben Hilfenhaus, who was thrust into more work because of the Mitchell Johnson Crisis, and for all the impact Phillip Hughes has so far had on this series, Australia might as well have taken the field with Howard Hughes.

England hopes will centre on the Lancashire duo of James Anderson and Andrew Flintoff, and a first significant contribution with the ball will be needed from Graeme Swann, still awaiting a first wicket of the series.

Swann will be heartened that, despite nursing a damaged bowling hand, Australia’s frontline off-spinner, Nathan Hauritz, extracted turn and was rewarded with three good wickets before fatigue and a concerted assault by Matt Prior and Paul Collingwood took their toll.

Hauritz had earlier played a part in convincing England captain Andrew Strauss that he should not enforce the follow-on after securing a first-innings lead of 210. Hauritz and Peter Siddle added 40 in 10 overs during which the ball swung far less under sunny skies than it had under clouds on Friday. In the end, Graham Onions’s probing off-stump line accounted for both, but Strauss was uncertain enough about what to do next to leave the field briefly, presumably to discuss his options with Andy Flower. It was, apparently, a very close call.

Strauss was probably wise to bat again. England have been caught out at Lord’s in these situations before, notably against South Africa in 2008 as well as against Sri Lanka in 2006. Neither game was won. The Sri Lanka match expedited Flintoff’s first major visit to the ankle surgeon — and Flintoff’s state of health may have been to the forefront of Strauss’s mind yesterday. He had still not called on Flintoff to bowl when the last wicket fell an hour into the day, which suggested that he was holding him back to bowl in the follow-on.

In the end, the overhead conditions probably made up Strauss’s mind for him. Today’s forecast suggests showers but that brings with it the possibility of cloud cover. A swinging ball is England’s surest route to victory.

As it happened, after Strauss and Alastair Cook — who again batted as though he had been taking coaching lessons from Gordon Greenidge — had moved serenely to 57 for no wicket at lunch, the ball did start swinging. Before that, England’s openers had fallen to some canny bowling from Hauritz. This brought together Ravi Bopara and Kevin Pietersen, one out of form, the other compromised by injury, and a tortuous passage of play followed as they were pinned down by Siddle and Hilfenhaus, who swung the ball tirelessly through an 11-over spell.

But neither Pietersen nor Bopara would have survived six overs had the Australia captain not missed a chance to run out Pietersen on 10 and put down a sitter from Bopara in the slips on nine. The raggedness of Ponting’s performance, following on from his unlucky dismissal, spoke volumes of his state of mind. Nor was his mood improved by Bopara standing his ground after Hauritz’s claim for a catch at mid-on, which the third umpire turned down because the evidence was inconclusive. In 19 overs to tea, Bopara and Pietersen added 36 as England’s progress stalled. Both fell soon after, opening the way for Collingwood and Prior to flog a tiring attack for 86 rumbustious runs from 74 balls. Johnson escaped the punishment because Ponting could not trust to give him the ball. It was Hilfenhaus at one end and Outhouse at the other.

Prior looked set for a century of Adam Gilchrist-style velocity before he was cut short by a direct hit from the deep by Marcus North with Prior a yard short of his ground. But this only brought in Flintoff with licence to do what he does best, give the ball a bash. Which he did.

When rain brought an early close and denied them the chance of a few overs at the Australian openers, England had topped 180 runs in the final session. We had seen this sort of brutality before in Ashes series but rarely with England on top.

It has been an extraordinary turnaround since last weekend, when England looked dead in the water on the final morning in Cardiff. But, not for the first time, a team managing to wriggle off the hook in one game has come back strongly in the next. India did this in England two years ago, when they scraped a draw at Lord’s with nine wickets down and went on to win the series. England turned the tables on South Africa in 1998 by holding out for a draw at Old Trafford — again, nine wickets down — before winning the next two Tests to sneak the series 2-1.

Australia, having endured a long and frustrating day in the field last Sunday, were condemned to go back out there straightaway. It took its toll on Johnson, who must have felt culpable for the job not being finished in Cardiff. He has simply got worse and worse, the Lord’s slope playing havoc with a wobbly action.

Johnson was not alone as Australia paid a heavy price for fielding an attack that had no previous experience of playing at Lord’s. Stuart Clark might have been an option worth considering. Come Edgbaston, either Clark or Brett Lee, if fit, may well have to be parachuted in for Johnson.