By Jonathan Agnew BBC cricket correspondent at Trent Bridge

Steven Finn and James Anderson took eight wickets between them

This was our first chance to see England's Ashes attack as a quartet and they all bowled well today.

James Anderson was outstanding because he kept it simple. I have been very critical of him in the past, particularly against left-handers, because he has been guilty of trying to be too clever, trying to swing the ball away from them.

He must have seen from Mohammad Asif that the way you get left-handers out is by swinging the ball into them and trapping them lbw. Today, Anderson did that and that was great to see.

Andrew Strauss set sensible fields, with an extra man on the leg side, encouraging all the bowlers to bowl straight, which meant they could attack the stumps and all three seamers benefitted from that.

Steven Finn hit the pitch hard and took wickets in the way you expect a tall bowler to do. Having had a break, he was straight back in the groove and looked like he'd never been away.

But the one thing that worries me about him is that he's a very energetic bowler. He runs in hard and everything is a big effort for him.

If it is hot, playing back-to-back Tests in Australia is going to take a lot out of him.

The England and Wales Cricket Board has been much-maligned for sending players off for strength and conditioning training but it seems to have worked, if the examples of Finn and Stuart Broad are anything to go by.

Broad wasn't very keen on taking a break at the time and I was also hearing rumours that Finn was a bit frustrated, but if it keeps them fitter and stronger for longer then who can argue with it?

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The Trent Bridge pitch is a bit dry and is probably a day advanced, but the wickets that have fallen have not been due to the pitch.

They have been due to atmospheric conditions, some very skilful swing bowling and some rather negligent footwork on behalf of the batsmen, who don't play the swinging ball very well. The odd ball has moved but it certainly isn't a 15 wickets in a day pitch.

I'd certainly rather watch this Test match than the one that just ended in Colombo, after 17 wickets fell in five days.

You don't want poor pitches, but you do need to keep games moving. There was no point in playing that Test in Colombo - they might as well have given up and gone home.

You have to have pitches that give bowlers a chance of getting wickets, otherwise there's no contest.

The Decision Review System (DRS) continues to throw up interesting sub-plots and I'm still baffled by Azhar Ali's bizarre dismissal.

I can only think it was total inexperience, naivety and nervousness on behalf of a youngster who didn't dare review his decision.

It was extraordinary - the DRS is there to rule out mistakes like that.

He'll have known that he didn't hit the ball and that it hit his trousers. It would be very interesting to hear his explanation, which I assume the coach will have demanded when he came into the dressing room.

Lastly, it was a shame to see the players being brought off for bad light when the floodlights were on.

It's very difficult to explain to people who have paid a lot of money to come and watch that the lights can come on and the players still go off. If you are going to use the floodlights you have to play under them.

Jonathan Agnew was talking to BBC Sport's Sam Sheringham.

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