England's friendly against Denmark at Old Trafford on Sunday may seem a meaningless fixture, but its importance was underlined when Sven Goran Eriksson chose the team's Euro 2004 base in Portugal to reveal his squad. 100: 100min, 136 balls.Flintoff 50: 52min, 37 balls, 6 fours, 4 sixes.ENGLAND WON BY SEVEN WICKETS Umpires: A F M Akhtaruddin and Aleem DarTV Replay Umpire: Mahbubur RahmanMatch Referee: Wasim RajaMan of the Match: A Flintoff. 100: 197min, 271 balls.ENGLAND M E Trescothick b Mushfiqur Rahman 9 V S Solanki lbw b Tapash Baisya 0 M P Vaughan not out 37 P D Collingwood b Tapash Baisya 11 A Flintoff not out 70 Extras (b4,lb2,w2,nb2) 10 TOTAL (for 3, 115min, 27.4 overs) 137 Fall: 1-5 (Solanki), 2-19 (Trescothick), 3-37 Collingwood).Did not bat: R Clarke, I D Blackwell, C M W Read, A F Giles, R L Johnson, J M Anderson.Bowling: Tapash Baisya 7-0-35-2 (nb2), Mushfiqur Rahman 10-4-28-1 (w1), Mohammad Rafique 5-0-39-0 (w1), Khaled Mahmud 3.4-0-22-0, Manjural Islam Rana 2-0-7-0 (one spell each).Progress: 50: 65min, 86 balls 15 overs: 53-3. Inside there was some debate as to whether he was calling people to prayer or telling the captain to get his finger out.

That was until Rajin Saleh, a spirited little right-hander, and Mushfiqur Rahman showed some fight. The pair put on 53 before Saleh pulled a long-hop from Rikki Clarke to Ashley Giles at backward square-leg.There was still an ironic air to the cheers when a run was scored. The local muezzin started to be heard outside the ground when Khaled Mahmud was at the crease. It is why Marcus Trescothick and Paul Collingwood should not have played the reckless strokes which caused their downfall.England's bowlers did all that could be asked of them against the shell-shocked batting line-up they faced, but their figures were slightly flattering Richard Johnson was the pick.

The Somerset swing bowler extracted bounce from this docile pitch and moved the new ball away from the bat at pace in his opening spell. Johnson fully deserved his two early wickets and it is still hard to believe that England, if they are taking their strongest possible side to Sri Lanka for the Test series, are going to send him home at the end of the one-day programme.At one stage it appeared as though the 25,000 crowd would be on their way home before the lights could be switched on. However, these bad habits, which are hard to shake off, could prove costly when England play Sri Lanka. Facing decent opposition can be a shock to the system when you are used to having things all your own way.