Pakistan vs England in 2024/25: Never had England been so ‘clinically ambushed’

Pakistan v England in 2024/25: Lawrence Booth

Test matches (3): Pakistan 2 (24pts), England 1 (12pts)

Before the first Test at Multan, England head coach Brendon McCullum said his side’s 3-0 whitewash in Pakistan two years earlier had been an “outlier”. When they racked up 823-7 a few days later, setting up a victory as astounding as any in the Bazball era, his words sounded like false modesty. Yet in the very scale of Pakistan’s defeat lay the seeds of their recovery. In a manoeuvre that only they could have contrived, let alone conceived, they tore up their strategy and embarked on one of Test cricket’s most memorable fightbacks. England had never lost a three-match series from 1-0 up; perhaps, too, they had never been so clinically ambushed.

At the heart of Pakistan’s resurrection were two thirty-something slow bowlers, left-armer Nauman Ali and off-spinner Sajid Khan, who had been unwanted for the first Test, when Abrar Ahmed was the lone frontline spinner. But he was hospitalised by dengue fever midway through the game, and did not feature again. Upheaval ensued. The Pakistan Cricket Board installed a new selection committee, including the former Test seamer Aqib Javed and the former international umpire Aleem Dar. Head coach Jason Gillespie, to his publicly stated irritation, and captain Shan Masood no longer had a vote. Nor did they have a say in what happened next.

Preparations and refurbishments for the Champions Trophy, scheduled for February and March 2025, had temporarily ruled out Lahore and Karachi as Test venues. It was decided – late on – that Multan would stage the second Test too, while Rawalpindi would keep the third, though ongoing protests there in support of the incarcerated Imran Khan, Pakistan’s former captain and prime minister, briefly raised the prospect of Multan hosting the whole series.

Yet the events of the first Test had persuaded Aqib and Aleem that England could not be beaten on a flat track. They ordered spinning surfaces – and how. With the second Test played on the same pitch as the first, and into its ninth day by the time England resumed their second innings on 36-2 in pursuit of 297, Nauman and Sajid became the first pair of spinners to share all 20 wickets in a Test since Jim Laker (19) and Tony Lock (one) against Australia at Old Trafford in 1956. ICC referee Richie Richardson was uneasy about the decision to ignore three fresh surfaces on offer at Multan, but settled for a quiet mention in his post-match report.

Pakistan’s job was only half-complete. Almost the minute they had squared the series, the think tank flew north to oversee the build-up to the decider. There, they were equally inventive. In an attempt to dry out Rawalpindi’s famously unyielding pitch, giant heaters were employed alongside the industrial-sized fans used for the previous game; liberal use of a rake added the finishing touches. Nauman and Sajid this time shared 19, and Pakistan had won a home Test series for the first time since 2020/21. The sight of Sajid twirling his vaudeville moustache and celebrating wickets with a dance derived from the South Asian sport of kabaddi added to the sense that England had become the punchline in a joke beyond their control. Richardson later ruled the pitches for all three Tests “satisfactory”.

Previous English teams might have grumbled, but this one – save for a couple of knowing references to rakes – accepted they had been outplayed. In both Tests they lost, they had established a platform: in the second, they were 211-2 on the second evening in reply to Pakistan’s 366, before losing four quick wickets; in the third, they reduced their hosts to 177-7 in reply to 267, and had the advantage of bowling last. But Pakistan showed more resolve and skill, not least when Agha Salman exploited dropped catches to give them a crucial lead in the second, and Saud Shakeel manipulated singles at will during a superb century in the third, with Nauman and Sajid helping him add 167 for the last three wickets. Barely 24 hours after England were eyeing a series win, they had slumped to defeat – only their second out of nine under McCullum and Ben Stokes.

The contrast with the first Test could not have been greater. In response to Pakistan’s imposing 556, England had raced at five and a half an over to their third-largest total. Central to it was a partnership of historic proportions: the 454 between Joe Root, who made a career-best 262, and Harry Brook, whose 317 was England’s first triple-century for 34 years, was their highest for any wicket, and a Test record for the fourth. At one stage, the scoreboard read 703-3, like some nightmarish throwback to the era of timeless Tests. Overwhelmed, Pakistan collapsed on the fourth evening, before Jack Leach cleaned up next morning.

But the arrival of Nauman, who had won the last of his 15 caps in July 2023, and Sajid, who had played only one Test since March 2022 (and later that year managed just five Championship wickets at 71 for Somerset), were not Pakistan’s only changes. Babar Azam was dropped – a revolutionary move in a country that reveres its few sporting stars. Fast bowlers Shaheen Shah Afridi and Naseem Shah were left out too, after a combined three for 277 in the first Test. Babar’s replacement was Kamran Ghulam, a 29-year-old who had emerged from a labyrinthine domestic system, and now marked his debut with a pristine century. Aamer Jamal, meanwhile, was their only seamer for the last two games, in which he bowled just six overs. Indeed, while the deceptively languid Nauman and the more combative Sajid finished with 39 wickets at 17, the other eight Pakistanis who bowled in the series took eight at 116. Had leg-spinner Zahid Mahmood not removed Jamie Smith in the first innings at Rawalpindi, the two main spinners would probably have shared all 40.

England’s numbers were similarly lopsided. After their 823-7 (a wicket every 21 overs), they lost 814 for 40 (a wicket every five). Meanwhile, the partnership between Root and Brook was higher than each of the team’s subsequent match aggregates: 435 and 379. But, mirroring England’s decline, the Yorkshiremen spiralled as the pitches spun: Root managed just 90 more in four innings, Brook 56. Among the rest of the batters, only Ben Duckett had any discernible gameplan, passing 50 three times in all. And not until Smith hit straight and powerfully for 89 on the first day of the third Test did the tourists stop relying on the sweep. For Ollie Pope, who averaged 11, and Zak Crawley, unpicked by Nauman after a brisk 78 against the seamers in the first Test, it proved a chastening tour. Stokes was left to insist that his top six were the best the country had.

Nor could the spinners match Pakistan’s. Leach, in his first series since injuring his knee in India in January, was the steadiest, becoming England’s leading spinner in Tests in Asia while collecting 14 wickets in the first two games. Shoaib Bashir had his moments, but was still learning on the job, not least against the right-handers, and managed only nine wickets at nearly 50. A first-innings four-for from Rehan Ahmed at Rawalpindi was a reminder of his talents.

England’s seamers pulled their weight in merciless conditions, with temperatures touching 40°C for the first of the Multan games. Winning his first two caps, Brydon Carse was fast and hostile; with better support from fielders, he would have picked up more than nine wickets, before England rested him for the decider. Gus Atkinson confirmed the impression he had made during the summer, while the indefatigable Matthew Potts was unlucky to play only once. Chris Woakes bowled Abdullah Shafique with the first ball of Pakistan’s second innings in the series opener, but an average of 55 was par for his overseas course.

For England, the greatest disappointment was Stokes, who returned from the hamstring injury that had ruled him out of the home series against Sri Lanka and the first Test here. He looked all at sea against spin, and bowled only ten overs, despite assurances he was fully fit. His dismissal on the third (and final) morning of the third Test – leg-before offering no shot to Nauman – summed up his side’s all-or-nothing approach. Just as worryingly, he was off the pace as captain, prompting McCullum to suggest that his “messaging” had been less clear than normal. He added: “It’s our job to make sure we wrap our arms around him and help him along the way.” It later emerged that masked burglars had broken into the Stokes family home on the third evening of the Second Test, while his wife and children were in bed. Stokes opted to stay in Pakistan, but was not his ebullient self.

For Masood, despite his loss of influence, the series was a triumph. A fan of Bazball, he had pledged brighter cricket, and was true to his word, cracking 151 on the opening day, and sealing the series with an unbeaten 23 off six balls. He then pointedly observed how glad he was to have won the third Test after batting last: Pakistan’s victory in the Second had been partly explained away by winning the toss. But England could have no excuses after Stokes’s habitual call of “tails” had finally paid off at Rawalpindi. While Pakistan celebrated their first series win over England since 2015/16, he and McCullum were left to reflect on the worst result of their reign.

England touring party to Pakistan, 2023/24

BA Stokes (Durham), R Ahmed (Leicestershire), AAP Atkinson (Surrey), S Bashir (Somerset), HC Brook (Yorkshire), BA Carse (Durham), JM Cox (Essex), Z Crawley (Kent), BM Duckett (Nottinghamshire), MJ Leach (Somerset), OJD Pope (Surrey), MJ Potts (Durham), JE Root (Yorkshire), JL Smith (Surrey), OP Stone (Nottinghamshire), CR Woakes (Warwickshire). JO Hull (Leicestershire) was in the original squad, but withdrew with a quad injury.

Head coach: BB McCullum. Assistant coaches: JM Anderson, PD Collingwood, JS Patel, ME Trescothick. Strength and conditioning coach: PIB Sim. Doctor: GC Rae. Physiotherapist: B Davies. Chef: DJ Pyle. Massage therapist: MES Saxby. Analyst: RJ Lewis. Team operations manager: AW Bentley. Head of communications: DM Reuben. Content manager: AS Taylor. Security manager: Y Ali. Security officer: LP Warnakulasooriya.

First Test at Multan, October 7-11, 2024

Matt Roller

England won by an innings and 47 runs. England 12pts. Toss: Pakistan. Test debut: BA Carse.

The Pakistani rupee had lost a quarter of its value against the pound since England’s previous tour, and the value of their runs fell at an even steeper rate. On the third evening of this remarkable series opener, England’s dressing-room started to describe their opponents’ first-innings total of 556 as “under par”. On the fourth day, they proved it by finishing with 267 more runs from one more over. Next morning, they became the first team in Test history to win by an innings after conceding 500-plus.

England’s fourth straight victory in Pakistan – and only their second by an innings in Asia – was manufactured primarily by Root and Brook, dubbed the “two greedy Yorkshiremen” by stand-in captain Pope. They piled on 454 in a partnership spilling into four sessions, England’s record for any wicket, and Test cricket’s highest for the fourth, beating 449 between Adam Voges and Shaun Marsh for Australia against West Indies at Hobart in 2015/16. It sucked the life out of Pakistan, who promptly collapsed on the fourth evening. There was another record along the way. When Root reached 71 with a straight-driven four off Aamer Jamal, he became England’s leading Test run-scorer, and waved modestly to team-mates on the balcony. He had explained in the build-up that he saw overtaking Alastair Cook’s 12,472 as “irrelevant”, believing he could score plenty more in the match; true to his word, he went on to a first-class-best 262. It was his first century in Pakistan after a curiously quiet tour two years earlier, and his sixth double – second among England players to Wally Hammond. He became the only non-Asian to score three double-hundreds in Asia, having already done so in Sri Lanka and India.

Brook had never scored a double at any level, but recognised the need to cash in on a heartless pitch. He had a life on 75 against Jamal, when the ball dribbled on to his stumps – off his chin – only for the bails to stay on. By the time he offered another chance, top-edging a sweep to short fine leg, he had become England’s first triple-centurion since Graham Gooch in 1990, when only one member of this XI (Woakes) was alive. It had taken him 310 balls – of the 32 Test triples, it was the second-fastest, behind India’s Virender Sehwag (278) against South Africa at Chennai in 2007/08. His 317 was the fifth-highest score for England, and their highest against Pakistan. Brook admitted he was unaware he had come close to Len Hutton’s 364; his only ambition had been to surpass his father David’s career-best 210 not out for Burley against Woodhouse.

Brook had changed gears after lunch on the fourth day, hitting 99 off his last 65 balls to set up a declaration at 823 for seven, the fourth-highest total in Test history. It enabled England to have a six-over dart at Pakistan before tea, and they were further buoyed when Woakes knocked back Abdullah Shafiq’s off stump first ball. On a blameless surface, but worn down by chasing leather, Pakistan slipped to 41 for four, then 82-6.

This was one of England’s greatest away wins – though perhaps only the second-best of the year, after their victory at Hyderabad in January. It was a result few England teams could even have imagined, but experience informed their belief that it was possible. “You take confidence from those previous performances when you’re that far behind in the game,” Pope said, citing wins in 2022 against New Zealand at Trent Bridge and against Pakistan at Rawalpindi, as well as the Hyderabad Test.

Brendon McCullum had played down expectations in advance, and England’s challenge looked tougher still when Ben Stokes was ruled out of a fourth consecutive Test because of a hamstring tear. The series started 28 days after Sri Lanka’s win at The Oval, the quickest turnaround between England’s final Test of a summer and their first of the winter, and only eight days after four members of the side had played in a rain-curtailed ODI in Bristol.

While the players were acclimatising to the heat – temperatures reached 40°C during England’s three training days – Jimmy Anderson was fighting the cold in Scotland, playing in golf’s Alfred Dunhill Links Championship at St Andrews. His control had been integral to England’s triumph two years earlier, and he arrived on the second day in his new role as bowling consultant. By then, Pakistan were racking up the runs, and McCullum’s decision to allow his absence – as well as his testy response to questions about it – raised eyebrows.

If England’s build-up was hardly ideal, it did not rival the chaos engulfing their hosts. Pakistan were on a five-match losing streak after a humbling 2-0 defeat by Bangladesh, and had not won any of their previous ten home Tests. But Shan Masood, their under-fire captain, praised the selectors for keeping faith with a core of players, which for the first five sessions looked a sound decision. After choosing to bat, he laid down a marker with a 102-ball century – his first in four years. For the eighth innings in a row, Masood was batting inside five overs, following Saim Ayub’s leg-side strangle by Atkinson, and he targeted Bashir after overturning an lbw decision on 16, which would have given debutant Brydon Carse his first Test wicket.

Masood and Shafiq went on to add 253, before falling in quick succession to tired shots: Shafiq poked Atkinson to cover for 102, and Masood chipped a return catch to Leach for 151, from just 177 balls. Woakes, playing his first overseas Test under McCullum, and his first in Asia since 2016-17, had Babar Azam lbw with the second new ball, to give England a foothold before stumps. Nightwatchman Naseem Shah and Saud Shakeel held them up next morning, before Pakistan’s third century, from Agha Salman, threatened to take the game away. The innings ended in farce: Abrar Ahmed survived a missed stumping and a dropped catch, only to steer his eighth ball – a bouncer from Root – to Duckett at slip. He held on, but dislocated his left thumb, and was unable to open.

That meant Pope walked out alongside Crawley to open for the first time in first-class cricket, after 149 overs in the field. He walked back again six minutes later, having pulled his second ball to midwicket, where Jamal flung himself to his right and held a spectacular catch. England were briefly in trouble, but Crawley and Root added 92 at nearly five an over before stumps. Crawley fell tamely for 78 on the third morning – his seventh score between 60 and 80 since his previous century – but Duckett’s thumb had settled down enough for him to bat at No.4, and he attacked Abrar during a 75-ball 84. When he was trapped by Jamal, from round the wicket, it brought together Root and Brook.

For the scattering of hardy England supporters, this provided a rare chance to witness a fusion of the past, present and future of English batting. Root looked in total control as he nudged, flicked, pushed and drove his way past each milestone, while Brook treated Shaheen Shah Afridi’s bouncer ploy with disdain, twice in two balls tennis-smashing him through mid-off. Root survived a tight lbw call on 168, and offered a chance on 186, when he pulled Naseem straight to midwicket: an inexplicable drop from Babar summed up his state of mind – and Pakistan’s – after a wretched recent run, and he was left out for the second and third Tests.

Chances were few and far between, with both players able to fall back on their physical fitness and mental strength in a stand lasting 86.3 overs. It was their second mammoth partnership, after 302 against New Zealand in early 2023, and only the second time two England players had made double-centuries in the same innings, after Graeme Fowler and Mike Gatting against India at Madras in 1984/85. Brook reaped the rewards of the work he had put in at the start of the year, when he missed England’s series in India to spend time with his grandmother Pauline on her deathbed. “If I hadn’t done that, I’d have probably got to 150 and slogged one up in the air,” he said.

Abrar bore the brunt, conceding 174 runs in 35 wicketless, maidenless overs, before spending the fourth and fifth days in hospital with dengue fever. Pakistan’s part-time spinners fared little better, though Agha and Ayub did at least take three wickets between them. Brook and Atkinson departed with England’s total just short of 800, a landmark reached when Carse launched his second ball for six. They declared shortly before tea, and Pakistan were six down by stumps. That included two wickets for Carse, who struck with his first ball when Ayub slogged to mid-off, then reverse-swung one between bat and pad to hit the top of Mohammad Rizwan’s middle stump.

Agha and Jamal showed the pitch had not suddenly deteriorated during a partnership that lasted 24.2 overs, taking the game into a final day. But Leach, recalled nearly nine months after his most recent Test, finished things off in a hurry: he beat Agha’s inside edge, threw himself to his left to take a return catch offered by Afridi, then had Naseem comprehensively stumped by Smith. It was Leach’s 11th win in his 14 Tests in Asia, a record bettered among visiting players only by Root (12) and Shane Warne (13). And it left Pakistan to wonder how on earth they were going to compete.

Player of the match: HC Brook.

Second Test at Multan, October 15-18, 2024

Rory Dollard

Pakistan won by 152 runs. Pakistan 12pts. Toss: Pakistan. Test debut: Kamran Ghulam.

Weighed down by a record-equalling 11-match winless streak at home dating back three years and eight months, and clearly outmatched in batting-friendly conditions, Pakistan decided the time had come for drastic action. Despite the slimmest possible window – three days – between games, the PCB hit as many emergency buttons as they could lay their hands on. Improbably, they also hit the jackpot.

First, they instructed ground-staff to abandon the designated pitch in favour of recycling the surface that had just seen more than 350 overs of action. It felt like Pakistan cricket’s most opportunistic pivot since the explosion of a gas canister during the 2005/06 Test against England at Faisalabad provided enough distraction for Shahid Afridi to pirouette on a good length. Meanwhile, a new selection panel had been rapidly convened, and instantly removed three of the team’s biggest names. Out went Babar Azam, whose sequence of innings without a half-century had grown to 18, as well as strike bowlers Shaheen Shah Afridi and Naseem Shah, both culled in the quest for all-out spin. Having literally been poster boys for the series – their faces beamed out from the promotional banners hanging from the walls of Multan’s stadium – the trio were suddenly absent.

By the time England arrived at training to the sight of an outsized industrial fan at each end of the pitch to hasten the baking process, it was as if chaos theory had taken hold. That Pakistan squared the series was a reminder that chaos is often their most useful weapon.

Embracing the turbulence, they built foundations around a century from Kamran Ghulam, the debutant unexpectedly chosen to replace Babar, and saw the hastily recalled Sajid Khan and Nauman Ali share all 20 wickets. Both had been sidelined amid talk of green pitches and seam-heavy attacks. Now, they became just the seventh pair in Test history to bowl a side out twice. The result may have come as a surprise even to head coach Jason Gillespie, whose authority had been severely reduced by the new selection group, fronted by Aqib Javed. On the eve of the match, Gillespie spent 45 minutes on the square in animated conversation with his new colleagues, throwing his hands up on more than one occasion.

And yet the game began as more of a slow burner than a big turner. Pakistan won an important toss, and reached stumps at 259-5, scored at a becalmed rate of 2.87 an over. Ghulam, who a few months earlier had been playing for Hoylandswaine in the Huddersfield League, became the 13th Pakistani to make a century on debut, in a display of admirable composure. Coming in at 19-2, he put on 149 with Saim Ayub and provided welcome middle-order ballast. Watching from home on his 30th birthday was Babar, who magnanimously posted his congratulations on social media. Ghulam’s innings was ended late on by Bashir, but he was outbowled by his Somerset colleague Leach, who next day finished the innings with four wickets. Five went to Carse and Potts, who with Stokes, England’s fit-again captain, formed an all-Durham pace attack.

Pakistan’s 366 was not only the biggest score of the game – it also used up four full sessions of the best batting conditions. Initially, England looked as if they might respond in kind. Duckett had claimed to possess ten different sweeps, and cycled cheerily through his arsenal on his way to an excellent 114, his fourth Test century. As he showed off his range – regular sweeps and reverses, fine tickles and slog-sweeps – it looked as if Pakistan had merely unlocked his full potential. Along the way he became the fastest to 2,000 Test runs by balls, his 2,293 beating New Zealand’s Tim Southee by 125. At 211-2, England were on course for a handy lead.

But they had peaked: having racked up 1,034 runs for the loss of nine wickets since the start of the series, they lost their next four for 14, as Sajid made his move, a vicious offbreak to bowl Brook the clearest warning of things to come. His reactions were no less dramatic, an eye-bulging, thigh-slapping extravagance that brimmed with main-character energy. He picked up where he left off on the third morning, summing up his dominance by bowling Potts between his legs. Sajid finished with seven wickets, and Nauman three; England had lost eight for 80.

A first-innings deficit of 75 might not have proved fatal, but England needed to be immaculate in the field. For a while they were, all three edges going to hand, as Bashir – sharing the new ball with Leach – removed Abdullah Shafiq, Shan Masood and Ayub in a seven-over stint before lunch. Pakistan were five down and fewer than 200 ahead when two critical moments occurred. Carse had just taken out Mohammad Rizwan, and was hungry for more when he had Agha Salman, still in single figures, put down twice in three balls. The first was a regulation nick sailing through at perfect pace and height, only to pop out of Smith’s gloves. The subcontinent can be a tricky testing ground for young wicketkeepers, but this was a rank error. Carse took Agha’s edge a second time. This one carried to Root at first slip, a lower, tougher chance, but catchable. Carse slumped to his haunches and bellowed in frustration; he was soon spent. Stokes was even less impressed, and later apologised to team-mates for behaving like a “tired and grumpy old man”. The cost quickly mounted, Agha top-scoring with 63, and leading a stand of 65 with Sajid. By the time both were out, England needed 297, which was 88 more than they had successfully chased in Asia.

A side who have made a habit of rewriting the record books might not have been overawed, but it soon became apparent that they were now part of someone else’s story. The stage belonged to Nauman and Sajid, with the left-armer this time the leading man. They bowled unchanged for 33.3 overs, as England crumbled. Neither opener reached the close, Duckett following his hundred with a second-ball duck, and Crawley stumped after ambling down the track.

England made the right noises overnight, but next morning Sajid made short work of Pope, to take his match haul to nine, before Nauman took over. He removed Root, sweeping, though DRS suggested the ball only just hit the pad in line with off stump. But there was no doubt about the rest, as Nauman claimed the last seven in ten rampant overs, to finish with a career-best 8-46. He toyed with his opponents on a surface now into its ninth day, varying his speed and trajectory to invite error after error. Among them was Stokes, who had swept and reverse-swept his way to 37, before he threw away more than just his wicket: racing down the pitch and swinging with all his might, he missed, but launched his bat 20 yards in the air towards square leg. It was a remarkable image, Stokes slumped on his knees facing point, as Rizwan removed the bails, and his blade soared skywards in the opposite direction.

As the dust settled, and there was plenty of it, Brendon McCullum congratulated Pakistan for taking a “good punt” on an ageing pitch. But Masood was happy to own the extreme measures after ending his side’s barren streak, and his six-game losing sequence as captain. “We had to take risks,” he said. “England take risks every day: they’ve shown the way. Whatever gets us 20 wickets, we’re willing to do that. We have to do what’s best for Pakistan cricket.”

Player of the match: Sajid Khan.

Third Test at Rawalpindi, October 24-26, 2024

Chris Stocks

Pakistan won by nine wickets. Pakistan 12pts. Toss: England.

Beside the sprawling Rawalpindi Cricket Ground complex is the Poultry Research Institute of Punjab. So it was apt that England, presented with another turning pitch, again batted like headless chickens against Pakistan’s spinners, and fell to a remarkable defeat.

A nine-wicket victory, wrapped up by lunch on the third day, gave Pakistan their first home series win since early 2021, and was no more than they deserved. Just as in the Second Test, proceedings were dominated by the good cop, bad cop routine of Nauman Ali and Sajid Khan, whose contrasting personalities and styles blended perfectly to take 19 wickets. England’s collapse of 7-46 on the final morning saw them hustled out for 112 – the lowest total of the Bazball era. It left a target of 36, which Pakistan knocked off in 19 deliveries for the loss of Saim Ayub. Shan Masood, under intense pressure as captain, sealed victory with a six off Bashir – his 23 runs had come from six balls in four minutes, sweet release after his wings had been clipped by the new selection committee. Indeed, during a lively press conference before the game, head coach Jason Gillespie had pointedly remarked that his own role had been downgraded to “match-day strategist”.

Yet the internal power struggles that so often define Pakistan cricket had stumbled on a winning formula. The foundations were laid in the days before the match, with the Rawalpindi ground-staff, led by the Australian Tony Hemming – appointed chief curator earlier in the year by the Pakistan Cricket Board – resorting to unorthodox measures to try to replicate the dry, used surface that had worked so well at Multan. After that game, Masood had remarked: “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen it turn in Rawalpindi.” By then, the job of transforming what had traditionally been one of the flattest pitches in the world was already under way. Patio heaters of the sort you might find in a pub garden, huge fans and windbreakers were assembled on the square, and rakes dragged across the surface.

There were no complaints from England, with Stokes insisting two days before the start: “You look down it and can have a good guess which ends the Pakistan spinners will operate from. It will be interesting to see how it goes.” It took one ball to illustrate how effective Pakistan’s constant gardeners had been, Sajid’s first delivery of the match turning so sharply it beat Crawley’s bat and pad, as well as wicketkeeper Mohammad Rizwan, to get England going with a bye. But despite low bounce, the pitch was not perilous, and Crawley – playing his 50th Test – and Duckett began with a stand of 56. When Crawley steered Nauman to gully, it was shot selection, not the surface, that was culpable.

The toss did not feel as crucial as in the previous match. But whatever advantage England enjoyed by winning it evaporated as they lost four for 28, and limped to lunch on 110 for five. Of those dismissals, only Duckett’s was blameless, trapped for 52 by a straight delivery from Nauman that barely left the ground. Pope, who confirmed the dangers of sweeping, and Root, who stayed back and missed a turning delivery, both fell lbw to Sajid. Brook, meanwhile, was bowled round his legs attempting to sweep his arm ball. It all felt inevitable, yet avoidable.

When Stokes fell in the third over after the break, Sajid finding the edge and Agha Salman taking a sharp catch at slip, England were 118-6. But batting became simpler as the ball grew older – as it would throughout the match. It also eased English nerves that Sajid and Nauman were separated for the first time in nearly 90 overs spread across two games. The 42 they sent down in tandem here were the most for two bowlers from the start of a Test innings since England’s Ian Thomson and Ken Palmer also managed 42 in South Africa’s second innings at Port Elizabeth in 1964/65.

Smith was key to the recovery with a counter-attacking 89 that included six sixes, the most for England in a Test innings against Pakistan. With him was Atkinson, his Surrey friend and team-mate, who had been rested for the Second Test but now helped him add 105; both
found success playing straighter and ignoring the sweep. Atkinson chipped a return catch to Nauman for 39, while Smith was finally tempted into a rash slog-sweep, miscuing leg-spinner Zahid Mahmood four balls before tea – the only English wicket since the fourth day of the first Test not taken by Sajid or Nauman.

England’s 267 seemed par, a feeling that grew as Pakistan slipped from 35-0 to 46-3, Ayub presenting Root with his 205th Test catch (among outfielders, only India’s Rahul Dravid, with 210, had more), and Atkinson spearing one back through the gate to bowl Kamran Ghulam for three. That all changed on a second day dominated by a brilliant, obdurate innings of 134 from Saud Shakeel, who tucked away 86 singles; his second fifty alone included 44. England coach Brendon McCullum said it felt like “death by a thousand cuts”. The fact that Shakeel hit just five fours during his 223-ball stay reflected uncharacteristic inertia from Stokes, whose defensive fields offered easy runs as Pakistan’s lower order took control.

The tourists had looked set for a first-innings lead when Pakistan, shaken by a spell of 3-14 from Ahmed – recalled for his fifth Test, after England left out Brydon Carse and Matthew Potts – went into lunch at 187-7. Strangely, Stokes did not keep him on after the interval, and an 88-run eighth-wicket stand between Shakeel and Nauman brought Pakistan to the brink of parity. By tea, taken shortly after Bashir pinned Nauman lbw, they were level. Then in a brutal passage, Shakeel and Sajid scored 46 from the first four overs after the interval, and took their stand to 72. Atkinson returned to bounce out Shakeel and, by the time Ahmed bowled Zahid first ball with a googly, Pakistan’s last three wickets had added 167, establishing a lead of 77.

To rub salt into English wounds, Sajid – knowing that Bashir and Ahmed would understand what he was saying, thanks to their Pakistani heritage – claimed he had deceived England’s bowlers. “Rehan and Shoaib understand Urdu, so to fool them we wanted them to hear that we were only looking for the single,” he said. “When we did that, they brought the field up, and the bowlers flighted it. Saud told me: ‘Once they do that, no half measures, just go for the big shot, as hard as you can.’” Ahmed denied he had been fooled, but the damage was done.

The first-innings deficit seemed cavernous when Sajid and Nauman removed England’s top three in the remaining nine overs on the second day. Next morning, any hopes of a comeback rested with Root and Brook, who started solidly, whittling Pakistan’s lead down to 11 in the first 35 minutes, before Brook gloved Nauman behind attempting to cut a quicker delivery. His removal triggered a collapse, the last seven falling in 17.5 overs. The dismissal of Stokes, trapped by Nauman after shouldering arms to a delivery that didn’t turn, summed up England’s scrambled thinking. Nauman finished with 6-42, and 9-130 in the match; Sajid with 4-69, and 10-197. With ten overs from Zahid, and one each for Ayub and Agha, Pakistan had not used seam all game – only the second such instance in Test history, after Bangladesh against West Indies at Mirpur in 2018/19.

England had forged their reputation by playing with freedom and bravery. Here, those qualities were replaced by fear and paralysis. That it happened at the venue where, two years earlier, they had produced one of the best victories of the Bazball era was jarring. Yet conditions, and Pakistan’s gameplan, had changed. Their series victory, the first time they had come from behind to win at home, was soon confirmed in the most emphatic fashion by Masood.

Player of the match: Saud Shakeel.
Player of the series: Sajid Khan.

Follow Wisden for all cricket updates, including live scores, match stats, quizzes and more. Stay up to date with the latest cricket news, player updates, team standings, match highlights, video analysis and live match odds.