Moeen Ali's scintillating century puts England in a commanding position

England consolidated their position on the second morning of the opening Test against India and looked on course for a massive first-innings total, with Moeen Ali completing a fine century here today.

The visitors, resuming on 311 for four after opting to bat, strengthened their position by advancing to 450 for six wickets at the end of the first session by adding 139 runs in just 30 overs.At lunch, overnight not out batsman Ben Stokes (84), who has hit 11 fours and a six in his 136-ball innings, and Chris Woakes (4) were at the crease.

The batsmen out in the session was last evening's unbeaten batsman Ali, who duly completed his career's fourth Test century after being one short of the coveted landmark at stumps on day one, and Jonny Bairstow who made a quick 46 off 57 balls.

Both wickets were claimed by pace bowlers – Mohammed Shami and Umesh Yadav, but overall the Indian attack looked listless on a track that still looked good for batting.Ali was out for 117 in a somewhat fortuitous manner for the home side that looked bereft of ideas as he shouldered arms to an angled-in ball from Shami and lost his off stump.

Wicketkeeper Bairstow chased a wide ball from Yadav and was caught behind low down to his right after Wriddhiman Saha had grassed two catches off Stokes in successive overs off the same bowler earlier.Right-handed Ali started with a flurry of fours this morning, three of those in one over from the wayward Yadav, before being dismissed. Ali, the second century maker in the innings after no. 3 batsman Joe Root yesterday, batted for over four and a half hours and struck 13 fours.

Ali, who added 179 runs for the fourth wicket with Root yesterday, put on a further 62 in 87 minutes with the left-handed Stokes for the fifth wicket.India's woes continued with Bairstow joining all rounder Stokes as the two attacked the bowlers – especially spinners Ravichandran Ashwin and Amit Mishra – with gusto.

Stokes and Bairstow put on a brisk stand of 99 for the sixth wicket in just



80 minutes and 127 balls against some mediocre bowling performance before the latter got out chasing a wide ball.

Ashwin, although getting some purchase out of the wicket, could not add to his tally of two and bowled an expensive and disappointing spell of 7-0-30-0.

Mishra, under-bowled by his captain Virat Kohli yesterday, was given a long spell but looked pretty innocuous and was smacked once for a straight six by Bairstow.

To make matters worse the Indian catching remained sloppy with wicketkeeper Saha putting down Stokes in successive overs off Yadav in his second spell,  when the batsman was on 60 and 61 respectively.They were diving leg-side efforts but should have been pouched by someone with the gloves on.

India had let off rival captain Alastair Cook, debutant Haseeb Hameed and Ali yesterday and the tale of dropped catches continued on the second morning.

Inexplicably Ravindra Jadeja, the local boy, did not get to bowl his left-arm slow stuff till 15 minutes to lunch by which time 26 overs had been gone through in the morning. He was replaced after one over.England added 60 runs in the first hour and another 79 in the second before the interval, reaching 400 in only 113 overs and 442 minutes, an indication of how toothless was the Indian bowling attack on the easy-paced track.

Ashwin had unimpressive figures of 2 for 138 off 38 overs at the break while Mishra's morning spell read 8-1-37-0 and he was wicketless after having bowled 18 overs for 79 runs in all.

Yadav had conceded 98 runs for the wicket of Root who he caught and bowled yesterday and was unlucky not to have added the wicket of Stokes this morning to his kitty, although he was fortunate that Bairstow committed a hara-kiri to provide him with his second wicket of the innings.

With plenty of batting still to come for the visitors, a total of well over 500 was on the cards which would put pressure on the Indian batting line up for the first time in recent Test games at home.