England captain Alastair Cook celebrated his 50th game in charge with his 29th Test century (105) and Joe Root, with whom he shared a second wicket partnership worth 185, was 141 not out at the close of play.

Mohammad Amir and Rahat Ali took two wickets apiece on a togh day for the Pakistan attack.

SOUNDBITE (English) Alastair Cook, England captain:

(on his 29th Test hundred in his 50th game as captain)

"It's been a while since I scored a hundred for England, so it was nice to get one. Also on the back of last week as well, certainly as captain you might talk a little bit more than the other players and sometimes it's nice that the actions back up some of the words you've been saying."

SOUNDBITE (English) Alastair Cook, England captain:

(on winning the toss and the importance of first innings runs)

"Yeah, I mean, it was nice to win the toss against Misbah (Pakistan captain Misbah ul-Haq) finally, and it was an opportunity to score a few runs on a good wicket. I think it will be good for a few days, but I think it will probably deteriorate as the game goes on. It will be good, I think, for the next couple of days, so first innings runs, as always in a Test match, are vital, but now we are in the position we are in, we've got the opportunity try and get well over 4-to-500."

SOUNDBITE (English) Alastair Cook, England captain:

(on going level with Sir Donald Bradman in terms of Test centuries scored)

"I can't really compare that, when he did it in half the games or even less than half the games, so it's just nice to get past 28."

SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Root, England vice-captain:

(on the improvement in England's batting compared to the lost first Test at Lord's)

"Yeah, I think it was just nice to see an improvement from the way we played the first game. 'Cookie' (England captain Alastair Cook) made a good point where he said he (Pakistan leg spinner Yasir Shar) is obviously a fine bowler, but if we can, the way which we played him, we played him a lot straighter, with a straight bat, not going across the ball as much on a day one wicket that made it a lot easier for us. Take the risk out of it and still rotate the strike, we still scored at a decent rate. I think the tempo we bat at throughout the game, throughout the day, sorry, was a lot better and we still managed to score at a reasonable rate."

SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Root, England vice-captain:

(on his own batting and getting a big score)