London: England’s new coach Peter Moores tried to play down the prospect of South Africa great Allan Donald joining his backroom staff after seeing the home side’s fast bowlers struggle during the drawn first Test against the West Indies here at Lord’s.

England’s quicks, notably Stephen Harmison, who had mediocre match figures of one for 138, struggled to make much of an impression against a West Indies side ranked a lowly eighth in the world Test rankings.

While five England batsmen scored centuries in the match, it required left-arm spinner Monty Panesar’s six for 129 to help build a first innings lead of 116 after Moores’ men had piled up 553 for five declared.

England’s pacemen failed to fire for much of their recent 5-0 Ashes drubbing, their drop in form coinciding with the return of highly-regarded bowling coach Troy Cooley to his native Australia.

Cooley, who now holds a similar position with Australia, was replaced by Kevin Shine, whose role has been called into question amid suggestions he will soon be concentrating solely on developing up England bowlers.

Donald, who knows English cricket well from his time as an overseas player with Warwickshire, has made no secret of his desire to work with England’s quicks. He had previously acted as mentor to Matthew Hoggard, when the two were in the same Orange Free State side in South Africa.

“Allan is very keen to come and work with us,” Moores told reporters after rain ensured his first Test in charge petered out into a draw.

“It’s a big positive that someone of Allan’s stature wants to come along,” the former Sussex coach added.

“There have been no decisions made because we’ve had a Test match going on, but now that’s over we can get into some discussions.

“I want to make sure that whoever we bring in fits our set-up and it’s the right person. We don’t just think that because it’s a great name we should just pull them in.”

And he insisted Harmison didn’t have a problem taking his form from county cricket into the test arena, recalling his 2005 performances in England’s victorious Ashes campaign.

“If you look at the honours board in the (Lord’s) dressing room, he’s got five for 43 against Australia in probably one of the biggest pressure games he’s played. He can play, there’s no doubt about that.”

Both Harmison and fellow Durham quick Liam Plunkett struggled for accuracy at Lord’s and the West Indies captain Ramnaresh Sarwan said: “We got quite a few bad balls. Our guys played really well and we made use of what we had.”