NOTTS trio Graeme Swann, Stuart Broad and Samit Patel could only manage one wicket between them on the opening day of the second Test against India.
Instead, it was Monty Panesar who marked his Test return with four wickets but could find no way past Cheteshwar Pujara as the tireless India number three once again confounded England.
Without Pujara (114no), augmenting the unbeaten double-century he made in India's nine-wicket first Test victory, England would surely have bowled their hosts out cheaply on day one at the Wankhede Stadium.
He survived while the rest of the top six faltered against Panesar (4-91) on a spinners' pitch, and then shared consecutive 50 stands with Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Ravichandran Ashwin (60no) to turn a vulnerable 119-5 into 266-6 by stumps.
The exact merit of that total will not be clear until England's batsmen have tried their hand on a surface sure to provide plenty of assistance for India's three specialist spinners.
Panesar, back for his first Test in eight months after a clamour for his inclusion here, bagged the prize wickets of Virender Sehwag and Sachin Tendulkar.
Panesar took three wickets before Graeme Swann was reintroduced to bowl at left-hander Yuvraj Singh, and the ploy worked with an off-break which beat the new batsman on the backward defence and disturbed off-stump again.
And Panesar got his fourth wicket when Dhoni was neatly caught low down at gully by Swann when Panesar got one to leap and turn.
Broad suffered as he shipped 60 runs from his 12 overs without claiming a scalp while Patel bowled just four overs, conceding six runs as India ended the day 266-6.