Usman Khawaja and Moises Henriques made starts, but they couldn't go on with the job on another tough day for Australia A in their four-day clash with the England Lions at the MCG.
In reply to England's 428, Australia A finished day two at 5-103, with Josh Inglis (13) and Jack Wildermuth (11) the not out batsmen.
Marcus Harris (6), Nic Maddinson (1), and Kurtis Patterson (11) were all out cheaply in the day-night fixture.
Khawaja (30 off 79 balls) and Henriques (25) failed to make the most of their solid starts.
Australia A were 5-80 at one stage before Inglis and Wildermuth steadied the ship.
Craig Overton and Ollie Robinson were the chief destroyers for England with two wickets apiece.
Earlier, Australian paceman Mark Steketee dismissed overnight centurions Dan Lawrence (125) and Dom Sibley (116) to help spark a collapse of 6-133.
But the Lions had already done the bulk of the damage with the bat on day one, and Australia's batsmen struggled under lights when they finally got their chance.
"They just bowled at the right time of night, there was a nice bit of dew on the wicket which quickens it up," Steketee said of England's bowling performance.
"I think that definitely helped their bowling attack. But now the ball is 36 overs old, hopefully Ingo and Muth (Wildermuth) can get a good partnership together and get us into the game."
Steketee failed to snare a wicket on day one, but he ended up with figures of 4-75 after a promising display on Sunday.
The right-arm paceman was satisfied to snare the scalps of the overnight centurions.
"We needed a couple," he said.
"They formed a pretty good partnership there. But they still managed to get 430, which wasn't real nice."
Australian Associated Press
