By Jonathan Agnew BBC cricket correspondent

Not many people fully understood the precise details of England's new strategy when it was unveiled the day before the match.

Wharf and Vaughan celebrate as VVS Laxman walks

One thing that never changes, though, is that bowlers win matches and the moment Alex Wharf claimed his third wicket in only his third over of international cricket, India were deep in trouble.

Wharf's start ranks alongside the most dramatic in one-day cricket.

He picked up his first wicket - Sourav Ganguly - with his fifth legitimate delivery. VVS Laxman, no less, became his second and Rahul Dravid his third.

It really was the stuff of which dreams are made and all of this for a man who was only called in because of an injury to Kabir Ali.

Wharf looks the part, too. Although, with his shaven head, he resembles a nightclub bouncer rather than a swing bowler, he has a lovely uncomplicated action which helps him to drift the ball away.

This is important: bowling actions come under enormous pressure in the course of a career, and therefore the less that can go wrong, the better.

Wharf has a high arm, which will help his direction, and he is classically side on: I could imagine Fred Trueman purring with pleasure.

It might simply have been a bad day at the office, but India will want to get things right at The Oval on Friday

Revitalised after his demolition of West Indies at The Oval, Steve Harmison is back to his best, and he bowled a bullying spell with the new ball before returning to clean up the tail with the second hat-trick by an English bowler in this form of the game.

Ashley Giles controlled things well in the middle of the innings while England's fielding - led by Paul Collingwood - was a huge improvement on their rather cumbersome exhibitions earlier in the summer.

The breathtaking catch to dismiss Rohan Gavaskar was possibly the best even Collingwood can have taken at backward point, and it broke the one partnership that threatened to set England a remotely demanding target.

The one downside to this performance was another failure by Michael Vaughan. He has now scored 47 runs in six one-day innings this summer, and he simply cannot get going.

He has passed 50 only once in his last 15 innings - and given that he bats in the first three, he should be doing better than that.

India were disappointing. True, they are missing Sachin Tendulkar, but their top order is vastly experienced, even without him.

In good batting conditions, they perished to a rash of poor strokes and did not give their bowlers a chance.

Their fielding is a worry too. On the evidence of the first match, there are too many cumbersome, slow movers.

It might simply have been a bad day at the office, but they will want to get things right at The Oval on Friday.