A good bowling performance - aided by a distinct lack of application from the Pakistani batting line-up - has Australia firmly in control of the First Test, but we should not be getting too far ahead of ourselves, because so far, the batting order has not looked convincing, Simon Katich excepted.

Neither side has handled adequately the moving ball. Australia was the victim of some outstanding swing and seam bowling from Asif and the amazing Aamer: the fact that Wasim Akram's protégé is still eligible for Under-19 cricket, yet is already a Test bowler of the highest class, is barely credible. But there he was at Lord's, bowling bananas, and troubling every Australian.

Skittling Australia for 253 was a feather in the Pakistanis' cap, but their batting line-up was not capable of following up the bowlers' success. Pakistan is rebuilding, and while I admire them for that, discarding the sheer experience of Mohammad Yousuf and Younis Khan and playing Test debutants at Nos. 3 and 4 is an accident waiting to happen - particularly when the Akmal brothers follow at No.5 and 6. Umar Akmal does not yet have the common sense to go with his top-shelf talent, and brother Kamran is batting a spot too high. But given that Shahid Afridi wanted to bat at seven - and wanted to play in the Errol Flynn manner that he has trademarked in ODIs and T20 - Kamran had to bat at six.

The Australian bowling was good: they had learned from their opponents, and concentrated on putting the ball in the right place and letting the conditions work for them. The poignancy of seeing Mitchell Johnson bowling well at Lord's nearly did my head in: a year ago almost to the day since he handed England the Ashes, he was back to his best, and he has to be credited with that. Hilfenhaus was a constant threat, as was Bollinger, although it was the unlikely (in my opinion) figure of Shane Watson who took the destroyer role. All Watson had to do was bowl intelligently, and he did, resisting the temptation to channel Dennis Lillee by trying to bounce people out, and simply putting the Duke in the channel where the conditions - and the poor application of the Akrams and Afridi - could help it.

I don't like Watson's over-the-top celebrations after a wicket - you'd swear he has just taken the Ashes-regaining wicket - but I suppose that if they have been as few and far between as his have in his injury-plagued career, it can be borne. It just reminds me of Brett Lee doing his chainsaw impersonation after knocking over Bangladesh's No. 11.

Of the Pakistan debutants, Azhar Ali fought hard until he was undone by a ball from Hilfenhaus at which he did not strictly have to play, while Umar Amin left watchers none the wiser as to his abilities, there for just three balls. With Umar Akmal playing across a straight one and his older brother completely misjudging the line and shouldering arms like an Australian, it was all over for the Pakistanis, with only the excellent Salman Butt showing Test-level application. In particular, new captain Shahid Afridi was a major disappointment, skying a catch off Watson to end a crazy-brave attempt to regain the initiative.

Afridi is one of my favourite cricketers, but what was he thinking? I suppose if it had come off - say, as his Test best, 156 off 128 balls against India did - he would be regaled today with headlines singing the praises of his élan and self-belief. The pundits would be saying that his boundless confidence and aggression is just the thing his young team needs, and that it's a new era for Pakistan etc. - but when it doesn't come off, it simply looks crazy. Clearly he could bat for a long time and protect his wicket - he just doesn't want to. That's fine, but when you're captain, and the two most important spots in your batting order have not played a Test between them, the Charge of the Light Brigade looks a touch out of place.

Not that the Australian batting line-up has had a great Test. In particular, what is it about not playing a shot: in this Test we have had Watson, Ponting and Clarke (pictured, above) all dismissed playing the leave. (In a rare feat, Watson managed in the first innings to be dismissed in two different manners by the same ball, neither involving the bat.) Ponting was unlucky in the second dig, but why are our batsmen now addicted to shouldering arms? After seeing Hussey demonstrate so spectacularly (and repeatedly) last year the pointlessness of leaving the ball, in England, why are they trying it? Where is their judgment? Tendulkar is a marvellous player of the leave. The Australians are not, yet they're constantly looking for the opportunity to do it, and against a moving ball and bowlers taking it both ways, that plays into the opposition's hands. Leave out the leave, please.

So, here we are, two days in, and we look like winning the Test - but there are still question marks over the batting. Katich has been outstanding, Clarke and Hussey were good in the first (but what is it with Michael Clarke and getting out in the last over of a session: that is a real worry), but it has become a tricky game for Marcus North - he would not like to fail twice in what turns out to be a comfortable win. Yet again he arrived in a collapse and promptly joined it, which is a major worry for our No.6. Hussey's primary in the second innings undid a lot of his good work in the first, and Ponting sadly leaves Lord's as a relative failure there in his wonderful career.

It would be nice to see runs from Paine and/or Smith, but their alibi is that they're not being relied on for them. What we can also hope to get out of this Test is a nice, long successful bowl for Smith.