Ashes tension threatens to boil over

The two teams meet again in the second game of the Ashes series at Lord's on Thursday and there must now be concerns that tempers will boil over at the home of cricket.

The worst incident occurred yesterday morning before play had even started as Kevin Pietersen and pace bowler Mitchell Johnson had to be pulled apart by Australian 12th man Stuart Clark. It happened after Pietersen had hit a stray ball towards Johnson in the tourists' warm-up nets and clearly rattled the England batsman who was then clean bowled for eight. Pietersen, who was labelled "Dumb" by Sydney's Daily Telegraph, tried to forget about his woes by visiting Boujis nightclub in Kensington, where he was pictured emerging in sombre mood at 1.30am this morning.

There was another clash when Stuart Broad appeared to deliberately barge Peter Siddle during the bowler's follow-through. Umpire Billy Doctrove was forced to intervene and warned the players to cool down.

Then, Australian captain Ricky Ponting reacted furiously at England's delaying tactics as Jimmy Anderson and Monty Panesar survived 69 balls to earn an improbable draw.

"As far as I am concerned it was pretty ordinary," said Ponting after England 12th man Bilal Shafayat twice went onto the field in the dying stages of the game while physio Steve McCaig was also ordered off.

"They can play whatever way they want to play. We have come to play by the rules and the spirit of the game."

But Anderson insisted today that the interruptions were not part of a delaying tactic.

"There was genuine confusion out there," he said. "The 12th man came out (left) to let us know that we needed to be playing the time left on the clock and not the number of overs showing on the scoreboard.

"As he was doing that he spilt a drink on my glove. When he came out the second time I had signalled for another glove but they didn't know in the dressing room whether I had called for that or because I needed attention from the physio. So that's why he came out as well.

"Obviously the Aussies thought we were time-wasting and, because of the situation of the game, I can understand where they are coming from. I think the physio got a few choice words from them. But it wasn't that, it was genuine."
Panesar finished unbeaten on seven, from 35 balls, while Anderson contributed 21 not out as England finished on 252 for nine.

"When Paul Collingwood was out I did think we still had an awfully long time to bat because almost 12 overs were left," said Anderson. "But then Monty came in and, after missing his first ball, everything else hit the middle of his bat."