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England added another entry to their list of horror starts to Ashes series when they lost Andrew Strauss third ball at Brisbane, but they recovered their composure during an enthralling session to reach lunch on 2 for 86. Alastair Cook showed impressive composure alongside Kevin Pietersen and Jonathan Trott was the other casualty when he gave away a promising innings against Shane Watson, but it's hard to split the teams after the early skirmishes.

The session could have been Australia's if Xavier Doherty hadn't spilled Cook's cut shot at point 10 minutes before the interval and the pace bowlers will consider that they didn't make the most of the new ball with inconsistent lines. Throw in the first use of UDRS for the series against Trott and an early taste of Pietersen's trial by left-arm spin against Doherty and the opening two hours of this much-hyped series couldn't have offered much more.

Strauss did his first job of the day right by winning the toss and, despite a green tinge to the pitch, taking the expected decision to bat first. After events on this ground four years ago all eyes were on the first ball of the day and the opening delivery from Ben Hilfenhaus sailed harmlessly past off stump. However, it didn't take long for the Ashes series to burst into life as two balls later Strauss tried to cut one that was a little too close to his body and picked out Mike Hussey at gully.

The England captain stood there, head in hand for a moment, before turning for the dressing room as the Gabba erupted to the cheers of the home support. Strauss had made two hundreds during England's near-perfect warm-up period and Australia knew how vital the scalp was. It took the visitors until the third over to open their account and that was an edge to third man by Trott, who then had to survive a heart-stopping referral when Peter Siddle's lbw shout was sent to the third umpire but pictures confirmed it was just clipping leg stump.

However, steadily he and Cook evened the scales. Trott provided the impetus with a neat flick through the leg side and two swivel-pulls to fine leg, but was also rather skittish at stages as he edged short of second slip and got a leading edge towards point trying to work through midwicket.

He had appeared to survive the examination when the ball was thrown to Watson who started loosely, but Trott gave his innings away with a loose drive against an inswinger which took off stump. England believe they can target Watson as a weak link in the Australian attack so providing him an early wicket will have been a major disappointment.

Cook, though, remained impressively solid as the quicks strayed a little wide as they tried to trouble him outside off and when they straighten up Cook worked through the leg side. His only boundary was a convincing effort as he latched onto a pull through midwicket off Mitchell Johnson, but he was given a huge left off on 26 when Xavier Doherty dropped a fairly simple chance at point off Watson.

Pietersen, meanwhile, settled himself in relatively calm fashion considering the often hyperactive way he starts an innings. He wasted no time in imposing himself against Doherty by advancing down the pitch but the early turn on offer won't have gone unnoticed by either camp.