Michael Atherton put the finishing touches to England's promising new opening partnership by adding to his long list of Trent Bridge successes against an increasingly dispirited Zimbabwe side.

Attempting to bounce back strongly from their first Test mauling at Lord's, the last thing the tourists wanted was for Atherton to continue his love affair with Nottingham and play a lengthy innings designed to test their already fragile morale.

But once play finally ended Atherton had taken his Test aggregate at Trent Bridge to 958.

He also stood just four short of his fifth Test century at this venue and had guided England to a commanding 203 for three at the close of the first day in a Test which is already beginning to look as one-sided as their first encounter at Lord's.

Atherton survived a shaky start to successfully forge a 121-run stand with Mark Ramprakash, the 12th opening partner of his Test career.

Their workmanlike but effective partnership was only the third century opening stand in the last 34 Test innings and provided England with encouragement that they may finally have found a pairing which could succeed in the months ahead against the far more taxing West Indies' attack.

Ramprakash fell when Zimbabwe recalled all-rounder Johnson from the pavilion end and he immediately generated extra pace and bounce, which surprised Ramprakash who edged to Grant Flower in the gully for 56.

Nasser Hussain looked as uncertain as any time since he took over as captain a year ago when he arrived at the crease and took 35 minutes and 23 balls just to get off the mark with a clip off his legs for four off 19-year-old debutant Mluleki Nkala.

England allowed their commanding position to slip and youngster Nkala, preferred to left-arm seamer Bryan Strang, tempted Hussain into an expansive drive outside off-stump which he failed to control and picked out Streak at wide mid-off.

Nkala, spurred on by his first Test wicket, then gave Zimbabwe their only crumb of comfort from their frustrating day by striking again in his next over with Graeme Hick also driving outside off-stump only for Brian Murphy to claim a brilliant catch at point diving one-handed.