Less than two sessions to bat with nine wickets in hand, it was a chance for Pakistan to secure a draw. In the space or 23 balls it all came crashing down
Jarrod Kimber07-Aug-2016Mohammad Hafeez is opening for Pakistan. Playing the first attacking shot of the innings, after five and a half overs of good cricket. It’s a poor imitation of Brian Lara’s back-of-a-length swivel pull that sails high and handsome, straight to the only man within 50 metres of it. Hafeez stares down at fine leg as if it is the first time he has ever seen that position before. His pure disbelief in hitting a ball in the air to an area that is covered on almost every cricket ground in the world is incredible.He is out, and embarrassed. But Pakistan have ten more men. They will stand up.The sun is out at Edgbaston. Cricket wisdom says this is a good thing. The pitch looks like a second-day pitch; it has barely a scar of battle. And it plays much the same way; flat, safe, lifeless. It hasn’t seamed or swung much all day.England look frustrated. Four overthrows are followed by three of their bowlers looking sullen at once. Steven Finn is still wicketless. Moeen Ali knows much is expected of him in a series he has mostly been hidden. And England know that The Oval may help Pakistan a fair bit.Then there is Sami Aslam, a man who was running drinks for Shan Masood a week ago, who is now batting like a ten-year Test match opener. Azhar Ali is in even better form than his first innings hundred. Behind them are two of the all-time greatest batsmen in Pakistani cricket. And two quality players at No.6 and 7. Not that they are needed with Aslam and Azhar in complete control. This is Pakistan’s time.Every wicket should be England prying it from their vice-like grip. They cannot afford one more Hafeez-type wicket.At lunch something changes. England goes from patient, to persistent. Stuart Broad bowls probing stuff, Moeen finds tricky drift. This is England’s time.Pakistan want to be No. 1, the undefeated at home, the warriors who travel, this is the match you need to save. Perhaps their chance of winning is gone, but the real teams, they fight like dogs to make sure they are not beaten. A day like this will have one moment when it will look impossible. It will be hard, but it is supposed to be hard to be the best, you are supposed to struggle.Azhar is the first to feel the pressure. He leaves a ball from Broad that he should have left, but England moan and he worries. A few balls later he plays the same kind of ball and misses. Then he does get an edge and it doesn’t reach Alastair Cook at slip. Now Moeen is beating him as well. It was his innings that looked steady as a rock; now it looks like a bunch of pebbles being thrown up in the air. He nervously pushes at a well-flighted ball from Moeen, his hand comes off the bat, and the wheels come off Pakistan’s batting line-up.
This team won’t be together forever; you only get so many chances. Their chance to fight lasted 23 balls
It is only one wicket, only two in over a third of the day, but it doesn’t feel like only that, it feels like Pakistan has Hafeezed two wickets and the rest are entering a fire. England expect more. Aslam has gone from a stoic crease warrior to an endless worrier, hitting the ball into his pads, playing and missing and barely getting away with jabbing down on a yorker. At the other end the Younis Khan impersonator continued to hop around until he lunged at a ball he didn’t need to be anywhere near, and he was the third Hafeez.At this time the tiny amount of reverse swing that Broad had found had started to go even further for James Anderson. It is Test cricket, on the final day, and it is tough, even with the many things in their favour, nothing is easy. But that is what was always going to happen. There was always going to be a period when the English team got it, they worked out the pitch, found spin, or made the ball talk, and when Pakistan had to stand tall. This should have been their time, and instead, they cowered and hoped it would go away.Misbah-ul-Haq, the one man who usually stands up, is pushing at everything. It is Finn’s best spell of the series; Misbah is taken. This is not how Hafeez would have been dismissed, as he simply wouldn’t have been that close to the ball in the first place. But without Misbah, who cares?Asad Shafiq is a flurry of movement at the crease, all the poise he has shown in the series is completely non-existent. His batting, his referring, his general aura, is all confused. Sarfraz Ahmed brings his natural energy to the crease, chases a wide one and leaves. And then Aslam, the young man who had set up the platform, who had tamed the moving ball, who had survived the panic, leaves a dead straight ball.Not all their batsmen played a Hafeez shot, but the entire batting line up went the full Hafeez. When they needed to be at their absolute best, when they needed to prove they could be No. 1, when they needed to believe, they lost 4 for 1. They were at their absolute worst, they proved they couldn’t be No. 1, and they showed they already knew it.These men, the Hafeez clan, then sit on the balcony and watch their tailenders, the worst of them, handle the bowling, the pitch, the pressure, for longer, and better. They saw 67 balls from Rahat Ali, and his back-foot drives, and Sohail Khan, with his legs side slogs, as it all got easier, and they weren’t there to use it. This team won’t be together forever; you only get so many chances. Their chance to fight lasted 23 balls.They are out, and embarrassed. But Pakistan have one more Test. They must stand up.
