Alastair Cook blamed his faltering top order for England’s failure to beat Pakistan after this titanic series finished in a 2-2 draw.
Advertisement
Pakistan’s achievement is all the more impressive as they have not played a Test series on home soil since an armed attack on Sri Lanka’s team bus in Lahore in 2009 turned the country into a no-go area for the world’s leading Test nations.
Pakistan win the first Test at Lord’s by 75 runs.
Chris Woakes feels like he now belongs in the England Test team after a heroic series with the ball against Pakistan saw him finish top of the most wickets chart. Misbah accepted the charge and was fined 20% of his match fee, while the Pakistan players were fined 10%. “It’s a fair result (of the series) in the end”.
Woakes went first, brilliantly run out by Riaz who swooped, picked up and threw down the stumps at the non-striker’s end.
Prolific Jonny Bairstow kept England’s hopes marginally alive on the fourth morning of the fourth Investec Test against Pakistan.
“It’s frustrating for us as a side and is a big area we have got to keep working on as a group because for us to take the next step forward consistent top order runs are vital”.
Ever since, apart from three one-day internationals against Zimbabwe in May previous year, Pakistan have played all their “home” matches outside of the country – mainly in the United Arab Emirates.
It was not the first time either this summer that England have let a Test drift away.
Warner was dismissed in the fourth over, caught behind off spinner Dhananjaya de Silva. “After being 2-1 down, losing the second Test badly and losing the third”.
Chandimal was caught behind after facing 356 balls and hitting 13 boundaries and a six.
Hales, Vince and Ballance have batted at numbers two, four and five respectively against Pakistan. “It’s mentally tough”, Misbah said as quoted by ESPNCricinfo.
Australian fast bowler Mitchell Starc, who took his third five-wicket haul of the series, said that the partnership between Marsh and Smith shows that the team is slowly coming to terms with the Asian conditions. Instead, in the blink of an eye, England’s only remaining ambition was to avoid an innings defeat, which they duly managed to ironic cheers when Finn clipped Wahab through midwicket three overs later.
“I guess we have started to turn it around in this test match”.
Pakistan may rise to number one in Test rankings was posted in Sports of TheNews International – https://www.thenews.com.pk on August 15, 2016 and was last updated on August 15, 2016.
Advertisement
There is still an outside chance Ian Bell, dropped for the series in South Africa last winter, might be brought back for Bangladesh and India.
