So David, in the form of James Taylor, got the better of Pakistan’s Goliath Mohammad Irfan and the rest of their attack to earn England an insurmountable 2-1 lead in this one-day series yesterday with batting of the highest class.
This third of four 50-over games provided controversy in the form of a spectacular collapse by Pakistan and then drama when England crashed to 93 for four chasing what should have been a comfortable target of 209.
Enter Taylor, whose lack of height has held him back at times, to play one of his most important innings for England to see them home in the company of Jos Buttler, making a return to form.
Yet however good Taylor (67 not out) was, this game will also be remembered for a section of the Pakistan innings when they appeared to lose their heads.This was lamentable from Pakistan, a show of ineptitude so woeful that it could only lead to suspicion because of the chequered past of Sharjah and that of a team whose history has been dogged by match-fixing.
Former England captain Michael Vaughan summed up the feelings of many when he tweeted: ‘3 run outs and a few iffy shots from Pakistan. Never seen that before!’ Then: ‘They must think we are stupid.’ And finally: ‘I hate the fact we watch cricket with so much suspicion. It shouldn’t be that way.’
Better, perhaps, to let the facts speak for themselves. Pakistan won an important toss on the same pitch where the third Test was staged and appeared set for a formidable score when they reached 92 for one in the 19th over.
Then they capitulated to lose nine wickets for 116, with virtually every dismissal self-inflicted, at least until Wahab Riaz launched a late flurry that took them from 161 for eight to 208 all out.
The run-outs would have shamed a village side, with Mohammad Hafeez selling a dummy to captain Azhar Ali, Mohammad Rizwan taking off without looking and Shoaib Malik turning so slowly that he resembled an ocean liner rather than an international batsman.
Just as poor were shots that saw Babar Azam, Hafeez, Sarfraz Ahmed, Iftikhar Ahmed and Anwar Ali culpable in their demises and led to flattering figures for Chris Woakes, who ended up with four more wickets. ‘That was the period when the whole thing went bad,’ admitted Pakistan captain Azhar Ali. ‘It didn’t look good but it was just bad running and some bad shot selection.’ In the interests of fairness, if Pakistan had gone from 227 for two in the 40th over to 283 for five after 50, as England did in the second ODI, eyebrows would have been raised.
And England’s Joe Root was just as culpable in his dismissal, when he hit straight to a boundary fielder. Certainly the venue did not help. Sharjah in the 1990s was the home of corruption in cricket and for a while lost its international status.
‘That’s a very sensitive subject and not something I’m going to get into,’ was England captain Eoin Morgan’s reaction to the suggestion that suspicion might have overshadowed England’s victory in any way.
Pakistan seemed wholehearted in the field — remember the biggest problem cricket has in detecting corruption is that it is often only chunks of games that are fixed — and made life extremely difficult for England’s batsmen.
The 7ft 1in Irfan provided Alex Hales with a taste of what awaits him in South Africa next month and also produced an uncomfortable moment for Morgan when a bouncer hit him on a shoulder and then cut his neck.
When Morgan missed an off-break from Shoaib Malik to become the fourth England wicket — debutant Zafar Gohar taking two of them — Pakistan were on top but Taylor, who thrived here in a warm-up match and the third Test, and Buttler came to their rescue.
Together they added 117, Taylor hitting Irfan for successive boundaries and then reaching his 50 with a six off Malik, before Buttler finished it with a six of his own to prove England can prosper when the ball is turning.
It leaves them one game away, in Dubai on Friday, from what would be an important series victory. – Daily Mail