THE only notable applause on a cheerless day at Riverside yesterday came when Shoaib Akhtar was introduced to the sparse crowd at tea-time.

Young ladies who had not previously emerged from their hospitality box to watch the India A batsmen suddenly appeared for a peep at the 27-year-old paceman, who is said to be the subject of much female swooning in Pakistan.

Durham opted not to unleash the world's only 100mph bowler in their four-day match against the Indians, who capitalised by making 275 for three in 91 overs.

Durham's priorities lie with the ten remaining championship matches, starting at Worcester on Wednesday, and Shoaib said all the right things when introduced to the media before play.

"I want to take as many wickets as possible and help Durham into division one," he said. "I'm here to play cricket and my whole intention is to do that. It's a full-time job for me.

"I also want to help the younger players and if there's time I would like to visit some local schools and do some coaching.

"I was going to join Hampshire, but we couldn't finish the deal and now I'm very happy to be here."

With Liam Plunkett, rested from this game, likely to open the bowling with Shoaib at Worcester, Durham have to decide who their third seamer will be.

Neil Killeen has had the job so far but his five championship wickets have cost 64.4 each, so there could be an opening for Ian Hunter, Mark Davies or Nicky Hatch.

There was little to choose between them yesterday. All bowled well enough, but it was difficult to shine on a typically flat Riverside pitch against quality batsmen pushing for Test places.

The diminutive Shiv Sunder Das, who made 125, played in 23 Tests between November 2,000 and last May.

He was in the Indian touring party to this country last summer, but was overlooked for the Tests, despite scoring 250 against Essex at Chelmsford.

Wasim Jaffer played in the first two Tests of that series, but was always overshadowed by the smaller man as they shared an opening stand of 122 yesterday.

Coach Sandeep Patil, whose Test career spanned the years 1979-86, said: "The average age of this party is 21 and there are five opening batsmen among them. The selectors are looking at whether there is a slot in the senior side for one of them on the tour to New Zealand in September.

"The youngest is 17-year-old Ambati Rayudu and the selectors see him as a very exciting prospect."

Play began at 10.45, as it will on each of the four days as it was decided to play Test match hours. The visitors had to make a late change when their fastest bowler, Avishkar Salvi, suffered a hand injury in practice and they also left out Sunil Gavaskar's son, Rohan, who turns out to be one of their elder members.

Three of the top five looked like midgets alongside the 6ft 8in Hatch, who towered over Das by 18 inches but looked more likely to remove Jaffer, who was beaten several times.

Das was fortunate on nine when he reached up to cut Hunter from eyebrow level and the ball flew over the slips for four.

When Jaffer edged Hatch just wide of third slip for four a fourth slip was posted, but after bowling seven overs he was replaced by Gordon Muchall and an off drive for four by Das signalled the launch of his more fluent strokeplay.

He was barely troubled until he reached 96, when he was rapped on the gloves by Davies and survived a big appeal for lbw next ball. But Durham helped him to his 170-ball hundred by carelessly conceding three overthrows as he took a fairly comfortable single.

He celebrated by driving Nicky Phillips over long-on for a big six, prompting more queries from the members as to why Graeme Bridge wasn't given a chance in this match.

Jaffer was out for 43 when he tried to pull Hunter and miscued to mid-on, then left-hander Gautam Gambhir, the only one of the top five who has not played Test cricket, played some delightfully wristy leg-side shots in making 35.

He fell to a good ball from Hatch, which lifted and flew off the edge to wicketkeeper Phil Mustard, who took a good left-handed catch.

Das followed shortly afterwards, dabbing with little foot movement at a ball from Hunter just outside off stump and edging to Vince Wells at first slip.

The entertainment dried up as the two new batsmen, left-handers Hemang Badani and Parthiv Patel, resisted Wells' efforts to tempt them into an indiscretion by bowling short with two men back.

Only 29 runs came in the first 16 overs of their stand, but then Patel pulled Muchall for four and the shackles were briefly removed until Hatch returned for another good spell.

He troubled Badani several times, but by that time there was barely anyone left to watch.

Twenty20 cricket this most definitely was not.

Read more about Durham County Cricket Club here.