The three-Test series between Australia and Pakistan remains locked at 0-0 after one of the all-time escape acts by the hosts in Karachi.
Having survived more than 170 overs in the second Test to claim a draw, Pakistan will feel like winners while Australia is licking awfully familiar wounds.
Whether captain Pat Cummins could have personally done anything different to force a result is up for debate.
What isn’t, however, is that the Aussie leader is sure to come under fire anyway.
These are the Talking Points after the final day of the second Test.
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CUMMINS AN EASY TARGET
Speaking after Pakistan’s miracle escape, Pat Cummins backed his tactics in Karachi, saying “he wouldn’t change too much to be honest”.
With the benefit of hindsight, others might beg to differ.
But the bottom line is that Australia had more than 170 overs to bowl Pakistan out on a day four and five pitch.
Did anyone really think that wouldn’t be enough at the time?
This was the first time in more than 20 years that Australia didn’t win having not enforced the follow-on, going 24 from 24 when making the decision until Karachi.
For further context on just how unlikely this outcome was, Pakistan is the only team in the history of five-day Test cricket to survive more than 1,000 balls in the fourth innings.
The alternative was for Australia to enforce the follow-on late on day three after Pakistan was rolled for 148 in the first innings to trail by more than 400 runs.
Whether Pakistan would have begun to fold in a similar fashion we cannot say.
It’s worth noting here, however, that Australia did the damage in the first innings between overs 25 and 50 when the ball was reversing, while the new ball was largely ineffective.
Pakistan would have had just over 20 overs to bat on day three had the follow-on been enforced — not nearly long enough for the ball to start behaving similarly.
On day four, as one of those bizarre unknowns of cricket’s dark art, the ball barely reverse swung at all.
Cricket giveth and cricket taketh away.
As such, there’s an argument here that Australia could have been in some danger of a Kolkata 2001 repeat if they did enforce the follow-on.
It was something Cummins was likely acutely aware of and steered clear, knowing 170 overs was enough time to create 10 chances.
In the end, Australia created far more than just 10 and still didn’t win the Test — so it’s worth asking ourselves who is really to blame here?
MISSED CHANCES…
Australia had plenty of them in that second innings.
The first and most obvious one to note is Steve Smith’s drop of Abdullah Shafique on day four. This was a regulation slips catch that strangely hit Smith in the stomach and went straight to ground.
Shafique was in the twenties at the time and went on to make 96 in a 200-run stand with Babar Azam that set the tone for the Pakistan resistance.
On day five, Pakistan’s captain Babar was given two extra lives in as many balls when he was on 161.
After stoutly defending Nathan Lyon all day, he suddenly popped up two blocks — albeit only slightly — to offer chances for Travis Head and Marnus Labuschagne fielding under the helmet either side of the wicket.
Both were tough, low chances, but it was not totally unreasonable to expect at least one of them to go to hand.
The last one came late, but would have opened the door for Australia to claim the win right at the death.
In the third-last over, Mohammad Rizwan was taking some risks to get to his century before stumps and picked out Usman Khawaja at extra cover.
Had Khawaja taken the catch, Pakistan would have had to survive two overs with its No.9 and No.10 at the crease.
But the Aussie opener dropped the simple chance to effectively seal the draw.
After all, 170 overs is an awfully long time to spend in the field.
“Look, we had enough overs to bowl them out and just couldn’t do it,” former Australia captain Michael Clarke said on Big Sports Breakfast on Thursday morning.
“We did miss a couple of opportunities on days four and five so they’d have to be disappointed with that.”
HARSH CAPTAINCY REALITY TO SINK IN
Despite the aforementioned talking points, the reality of the situation is that Cummins’ captaincy is still going to heavily come under the microscope.
The role of the captain becomes more important than ever when trying to chase a result on a dull wicket and, once again, Australia came up short.
The heroic efforts of Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan and Abdullah Shafique are the main reasons Pakistan escaped with a draw, and should be celebrated as one of the great Test triumphs (more on this below).
But the Aussie post-mortem will no doubt dissect all the ways that this situation could have been avoided given its position of sheer dominance after the first innings.
Clarke said: “Australia has to win that Test match.”
The first and most obvious point of discussion will be the follow-on and if Cummins should have enforced it.
But Australia’s go-slow tactics in the first innings to bat well into day three instead of accelerating sooner may also be raised.
“Unfortunately as captain … if you lose, now you question ‘did we bat too long in the first innings?’” Clarke said. “‘Did we need to bat in the second innings? Should we have sent Pakistan straight back in with such a heavy lead?’”
Cummins defended both calls, saying that Australia’s plan was to bat for as long as possible when the conditions were best.
“Batting into day three gave us that chance to really have a crack at them – probably went better than we could have expected – but over here the wickets are pretty good,” Cummins said.
“We tried to bat two-and-a-half days on the best time of the wicket, hoping that it would break up on day four and five and it held together pretty well.”
In truth, the conditions were rarely poor for the batters with the pitch offering little throughout, providing the ball didn’t hit a crack.
Cummins and Australia’s coaching staff had no way of knowing for sure what the pitch would do on days four and five and, ultimately, their judgments were incorrect.
Rightly or wrongly, that will only add pressure to Cummins who already came under fire in Sydney in January when Australia failed to bowl out England with over 100 overs to work with.
There’s also likely to be a frustration in Australian circles over the team’s worrying pattern of failing to close games out.
This is the fifth time in three years Australia couldn’t finish off the job in the fourth innings, following on from Headingley 2019, Sydney and Brisbane in 2021, and Sydney again this year.
PAKISTAN HEROICS WE CAN’T IGNORE
Australia’s shortcomings aside, this was an incredible display of mental fortitude from Pakistan’s batters.
To mentally set your sights on batting for more than 170 overs fresh from being rolled for 149 inside 55 is difficult.
To go and pull it off? Truly remarkable.
Some of the stats along the way were breathtaking.
The most fourth innings balls faced to save a Test in the history of five-day Test cricket, and the second-most of all time after England faced 1,746 against South Africa in a timeless 10-day affair in 1939.
Babar Azam led the way, making 196 from a whopping 425 balls. No captain in the history of Test cricket has made a bigger score in the fourth innings, surpassing Mike Atherton’s 185* against South Africa in 1995.
In total, he was at the crease for 603 minutes.
The series score may now read 0-0 but if momentum is worth anything in Test cricket, then it bodes awfully well for Pakistan heading to Lahore.
The hosts will feel like winners and, after that display of defiance, they certainly deserve to.
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