Sussex will last the pace in the battle to retain their title, despite a punishing schedule between now and the end of the season.

There are just two days this month when Chris Adams and his squad are not playing or travelling to matches while the workload between August 8 and the final day of the season on September 19 includes just four non-playing days out of 45.

Director of cricket Peter Moores, however, believes his squad will thrive during their hectic end-of-season schedule rather than wilt under pressure.

He said: "The lads were aware for a while that there was going to be a lot of cricket during the last seven weeks of the season and they have been prepared for it.

"We had to be a unit because if we weren't then the season would only have gone one way.

"Fortunately our players are aware of their responsibilities in terms of fitness and how they prepare for matches. It can be hard at this stage of the season, but at the moment they are waking up every day knowing they are prepared for cricket and enjoying themselves."

Adams is not happy with the lop-sided nature of Sussex's schedule this season. They played three Championship games in April, traditionally the wettest month of the season, but only three in total in June and July.

As the county captains' representative on the ECB committee which monitors the first-class game, he will doubtless make his feelings felt at the end of the season.

In the meantime all his energies are being chanelled into trying to sustain Sussex's best run of the season which has seen them win three out of four and mount a late challenge to Warwickshire, who have led the table since May 28 and are on course for their first title since 1995.

The county, who have a game in hand on Warwickshire, arrived at Edgbaston yesterday knowing that a first win in Birmingham since 1982 is vital if they are to close the 49 point gap between the sides.

With three days left a lot can happen but a Sussex win looks unlikely after Warwickshire closed on 177-2 from 60 overs.

Three draws from their remaining fixtures will probably be enough for the Bears so their no-risk policy here in terms of team selection and pitch preparation is hardly a surprise.

They have loaded their batting with Heath Streak, who has made a Test hundred for Zimbabwe, coming in at No. 8 while the pitch is easy-paced.

It helps when your captain keeps winning the toss as Nick Knight did for the 11th time out of 14.

Warwickshire's success this season has been based on getting big first innings totals and dictating terms from there.

Nine players have made centuries but no one has touched the heights of Ian Bell whose five Championship scores before this game were 155, 96 not out, 112, 181 and 121.

Many at Edgbaston reckon the innings which turned his career, never mind his season, around was the unbeaten 262 he scored on a featherbed at Horsham in May.

That form eventually earned him a Test call-up last week, when he made 70 against West Indies, but, if Sussex hoped he would find it hard returning to the grind of the county game after starring for England, they were to be disappointed. He looked a class act here.

In fact, for long periods during a rain-affected first day in which 44 overs were lost, it appeared as if there were two games going on - the one Bell was playing, where everything was being middled and the ball regularly finding the gaps, and the one being endured by the other Warwickshire batsmen.

The home side did well to get through the 60 overs possible losing just two wickets, both of them falling to Mohammad Akram.

Sussex did not concede a boundary until the 11th over when Bell punched a back foot drive off the Pakistani through cover before repeating the shot off the next delivery.

Akram had made the breakthrough in his previous over when Mark Wagh gave second slip catching practice, but unhinging Bell and Nick Knight proved an altogether tougher proposition.

Bell played superbly, timing his shots, particularly his drives through the covers and straight, impeccably. A slow surface gave him time to read Mushtaq Ahmed off the pitch and it will be a major surprise if he does not convert this start into a seventh Championship hundred of a prolific season.

Knight had more problems, particularly with Mushtaq's forensic probings, but he still passed 50 for the eighth time this season and it was a surprise when he edged an outswinger to second slip off Akram's first ball from the pavilion end. The second wicket pair added 130 in 39 overs.

Bell passed 1,600 runs for the season as he closed in on another century and although it looks as if he might be disappointed when England name their party to tour South Africa, on this evidence he has a great future ahead of him.

Prolonged occupation of the crease on the second day will virtually end Sussex's chances of preventing Warwickshire from taking their title from them.