England's spirit has been strong and the flesh remains willing enough but plans to start this Ashes year with a badly needed Test series triumph are in tatters,, with Andrew Strauss's men reduced to trying to prolong the agony.

Agony? The 51 all out in Jamaica, the failure to separate last wicket pair Daren Powell and Fidel Edwards in Antigua and now, at the Kensington Oval in Barbados, being on the receiving end of another masterpiece from Ramnaresh Sarwan — it has all been going wrong for England.

Strauss warned before the tour that playing a steadily rising West Indies outfit would be no walk in the sand.

Equally, though, he expected his side to emerge victorious — despite all those January ructions that cost captain Kevin Pietersen and coach Peter Moores their jobs — but now the best they can hope to do is draw the series.

For that to happen, England needed to extricate themselves from a potentially tricky Fourth Test position today before somehow winning in Trinidad.
At least completing the first of those two tasks looked more likely than not once Strauss and opening partner Alastair Cook settled into their work this afternoon. But then Strauss fell for 38, on his 32nd birthday, to send a flicker of concern throughout the camp.

Trailing by 149 when the two left-handers walked to the middle yesterday evening, Strauss and Cook followed last Thursday's mighty stand of 229 with a partnership of 88 — only for Strauss to play on attempting to cut spinner Chris Gayle.

Cook, though, survived skying a delivery from Sulieman Benn, which a chasing Brendan Nash failed to catch, and the England opener went on to claim his half century as his team reached 115 for one at lunch — 34 behind the hosts.

Given that the first four days on a road of a pitch produced 1,355 runs for the cost of just 15 wickets, batting out three sessions appeared simple enough for the visitors. In theory.

But less than a month ago England were shot out for 51 by these opponents in Jamaica.

“The pitch is slightly different,” said England all-rounder Paul Collingwood. “It has played really well and the batsmen are in good nick. We are confident, there has been a change in mentality. We will not go out there and bat for a draw but bat as if it's a first innings.”

When England scored 600 for six declared in that first innings, West Indies were under what Strauss called “scoreboard pressure”. But, despite suffering a couple of controversial dismissals by way of TV referral, West Indies replied with 749 for nine — their third-highest total against anyone and the second heaviest battering England have ever taken.

And all this, remember, by an outfit who have been so horribly down in the doldrums for several years that many people wondered whether Caribbean cricket would ever recover.

“Our goal was to come here and win,” said Collingwood. “Some people from outside might have thought we would come here and win comfortably.

But we know it's always tough coming out to the West Indies. They're a tough side.”

In fact, they have been too easy to brush aside for too long. Not now, though, and Sarwan's magnificent 291 — no matter how flat the pitch — provides more weight to the argument that West Indies have not only turned the corner but they are now picking up speed on the straight.

The No3 batsman has scored 598 runs in four innings in this series at an average of 149.5. And England simply do not know how to get him out.