What would be your reaction if the two players, who are out of form, script the victory for their team staring at defeat against the opponent lower in ranking? This is exactly what happened at the Old Trafford ground of Manchester where Jos Buttler and Chris Woaks, with a century partnership, grasped victory from the jaws of defeat. The duo proved that there is no other team in world at the moment which is mentally strong like England.
On the other, Pakistan lost the match on the fourth day itself despite taking an appreciable lead in the first innings and dismissing half of the opponent team in the second innings so early.
As far as Buttler is concerned, speculation was that he could be dropped after a couple of matches. But the way he performed with bat was reflective of his professional approach. As Buttler plays spinners well, Woaks kept giving him the chance to face Pakistan star leg spinner Yasir Shah. And Buttler did his job well. He played the spin with cover drive, sweep and reverse sweep, thereby puncturing Pakistani pressure. Pakistan bowler Yasir Shah could not pave the way for his team’s win despite taking eight wickets. By virtue of being a pacer, Chris Woaks easily understood the line and length of the Pakistani pacers. Keeping this in view, Buttler kept rotating strike and gave Woaks the chance to face pacers maximum.
Woaks played freely and openly when Shahin Shah Afridi and Naseem Shah bowled. His offensive batting made Pakistan loosen the grip on the match. Actually, the strategy of playing these bowlers in square direction turned out to be successful.
It’s a lesson for Pakistan bowling coach Waqar Younis that despite having superb upcoming attack, his bowlers kept struggling in the second innings of the match. Now, Shahid Afridi will have to avoid focusing only on fuller length bowling, which the England batsmen played comfortably. Afridi does take benefit of his good height and bowls in-swinger using high arm action that gives batsmen no space to play the ball. But batsmen could drive such balls and this results in pressure getting built on the bowler. As for Naseem Shah, he is a new terrific bowler who delivers ball at good length as well as short length. But what is not understandable is why he did not create pressure on batsmen by his bouncers on the fourth day.
Mohammad Abbas sent lefty Rory Burns packing. He can be useful by bowling wicket to wicket.
Pakistan’s fielding also let the team down. Yasir Shah dropped Woaks on the bowling of Naseem, and hence Pakistan dropped the match with that. His eyes were not set on the ball.
But primarily, Pakistan suffered due to their batting failure. If Broad and Anderson were unplayable, then it could have been the reason for defeat, but Pakistan batsmen gave away their wickets on a platter. The condition was such that lower order batsman Yasir Shah was the top scorer. At present, Pakistan do not have batsmen like Inzamam, Mohammad Yusuf, Yunis Khan and Misbah. Baba Azam has kindled a ray of hope but he does not get support of other batsmen and is left alone
England must be happy to analyse the victory that they have won the match in just four days and that too, despite bad performance of players like Joe Root and Ben Stokes. If these two batsmen performed like what they are known for, then Pakistan will have more trouble.