ENG vs PAK: England, one of the busiest teams in terms of red-ball cricket, is on their tour to Pakistan where they will feature against hosts Pakistan in a 3-match Test series. Though England does not stand much of a chance in the WTC any further, yet they would eye the historic whitewash from the 2022-23 tour.
However, the match started on the 7th of October at the iconic Multan Cricket Stadium, despite England suffering early setbacks as their skipper Ben Stokes could again not return to the field following his hamstring injury.
After the initial series loss against Bangladesh, this is a must-win series ahead for Pakistan to overcome the face loss from the burdened 2-0 defeat against Bangladesh. However, Pakistan might not be able to technically qualify for the WTC finals. However, after a series win against England and South Africa, they may have a chance if some other results go their way.
Pakistan went on to dominate the first test, as they batted for nearly 150 overs, which is over 2 days. The opening stand could not last long, however, Abdullah Shafique and Shan Masood both played a commendable innings, with hundreds from both batters, as the skipper posted a 150-run.
Though, Babar Azam continued his weak patch of form, Saud Shakeel scored a semblance inning with 82 runs alongside Naseem Shah. Though their best test batter, Rizwan was out for an early duck, Salman Ali Agha scored the third century of the Pakistan innings, as he helped Pakistan post a huge 556 runs.
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In the England innings, Zak Crawley came into bat with the stand-in skipper Ollie Pope after Ben Duckett suffered an early injury in the first innings while fielding. Batting with the Bazball technique, Pope in an early aggressive attempt to pull a ball was sent off by a screamer of a catch from Aamer Jamal, who is making a comeback from his injury.
However, since his wicket, Zak Crawley with his 64 runs at a strike rate of 100, showed full intent to score runs on a healthy track, alongside Joe Root, who turned the first-ever batter in the history of the WTC to have scored 5000+ runs in the red-ball formats WTC cycle.
Crawley is making a return to the format for England after his absence from the Test matches against Sri Lanka. Root now has 5005 runs in the WTC and has left his competitors far behind with this amazing feat. While Root is only 39 runs behind, emerging as England’s all-time highest run-getter in the longest format of the game, going past the record highest 12,472 runs of Alastair Cook.
