CategoryEng v Pak 2016

I think it’s best to forget last night’s T20. Pakistan shocked everyone by looking motivated, aggressive and desperate to win. England, on the other hand, looked somewhat complacent and relaxed. Mentally we weren’t at the races and made far too many mental errors. It’s always hard to gauge Pakistan’s mood. They’re usually entertaining to watch but one never knows if they’ll rise to a challenge or shrug their shoulders and go AWOL. Yesterday they were...

I don’t like to see one-sided ODI series, especially those bolted on needlessly at the end of test series, so I’m quite pleased that Pakistan avoided a whitewash at Cardiff yesterday. It proves that Pakistan can be competitive in 50 over cricket, and that England aren’t quite invincible yet. Although this series has seemed quite low key from afar (I’ve been in the Channel Islands for much of the last week) some decent cricket has been played. England’s mammoth 444...

Another day, another win. It wasn’t quite a walk in the park but it was comfortable enough in the end. The good ship England just keeps on sailing. Pakistan, meanwhile, look totally sunk. What was so impressive about this latest win was the somewhat unlikely match-winners. This time our star batsmen were guys who weren’t even required on Tuesday – Ben Stokes and Jonny Bairstow. The latter can’t even get in the first XI when everyone’s fit. I don’t think...

Well, it looks like I picked the wrong day to miss the cricket. My experience of yesterday’s action was as follows: hmmm, I wonder how England are getting on? Let’s quickly check the cricinfo app. 444-3! Blimey. Although ‘blimey’ wasn’t the exact word I used (this is a family site), you can imagine my shock and delight. Other than games at Jo’burg (or games against minnows) nobody has come close to scoring so many. At first I was somewhat euphoric, then...

This ODI series could get ugly for Pakistan. England won at an absolute canter at Lord’s on Saturday. The result was effectively decided before 10.45am when Pakistan opted to bat first and were reduced to 2-3. It reminded me of the bad old days when England used to get humiliated down under as a matter of course. You’d turn on the TV, see the figures 2-3, and then have a confusing moment when you tried to work out if we were two wickets down for three runs or vice versa. It was...

Congratulations to Pakistan on becoming the new world No.1 test team. I’m sure it feels all the sweeter because they’ve reached the top at India’s expense. Unfortunately however, Pakistan haven’t been anywhere near as successful in ODIs recently. In fact, they currently languish as low as 9th in the world rankings. That’s two places lower than Bangladesh. Hmmmm. Pakistan’s problem, on paper at least, seems to be their batting. There’s no Misbah, no...