The Full Toss

You can’t keep a champion down indefinitely. That’s what we learned today. Thus far this summer Younus Khan has batted like Bambi on ice. His footwork has been terrible. He seemed to be doing the charleston, the samba and some kind of Peshawar paso doble all at once. However, today he looked a lot more comfortable at the crease. There were no extravagant movements, no jerks and a far less pronounced crouch as the bowler ran in. As a result we saw the real Younus Khan: the man who’s scored 30...

Now that was one of the most entertaining innings I’ve seen by an England batsman for some time. It wasn’t a brutal seventy ball hundred, full of power hitting and brute strength; it was a study in elegance and panache. Mo, I think I love you. England were in deep trouble this morning. Alastair Cook won the toss, elected to bat on a pitch that offered a little bit for the seamers, and then watched his batsmen commit hara-kiri. Cook himself played on (he could have been caught at...

It seems a tad bizarre to me, but England could become the number one ranked test side in the world in a few weeks’ time. It’s enough to make the new breed of sensitive metrosexual Australians choke on their chicken and zucchini salads. We just need to beat Pakistan at The Oval and hope other results go our way. This intriguing development has arisen because the current No.1, our canary yellow friends, lost to Sri Lanka the other day. When a top ranked team lose to a low ranked team, the ICC...

I had a sneaking feeling that England would win. When faced with the pressure of batting out time on the final day, Pakistan’s erratic batting unit folded. I feel for them. Two of their three most experienced batsmen (Hafeez and Younis) are completely out of sorts. And when your tail begins at eight, you’re asking for trouble. In the end, it was too much for Sami Aslam, Azhar Ali and Misbah to do on their own. Make no mistake about it. This was an absolutely crushing defeat for...

Another good day for England. Although we lost both Cook and Hales early on, Root, Vince (yes, Vince), Bairstow and Moeen took the game away from Pakistan. Nobody went on to make a big score – although Jonny might seal a century tomorrow morning if Cook decides to bat on – but collectively the batsmen did enough. So now the million dollar question: when should Cook declare. At one point, after I’d got a few ales under my belt, I advocated declaring overnight. “Pakistan...

Ladies and gentlemen. We have a game on our hands. At lunchtime today it looked like Pakistan might bat England out of the match. But thankfully our bowling attack never gave up, limited the damage, and wrestled some initiative back by tea. Pakistan’s tail, which might rival Caddick, Giddins, Mullally and Tufnell as the worst we’ve seen in recent times, proved to be their achilles heel. With the score on 358-6, England’s tail might have added another hundred runs or more. But...