Pakistan's Ramiz Raja and Shan Masood.
Pakistan's Ramiz Raja and Shan Masood. Image Credit: X

It took Pakistan nearly four years before registering their first home Test series victory, as they drilled the Ben Stokes-led England side with a 2-1 margin. The start wasn’t great for the home side, with an innings defeat in the opening game in Multan, which was the sixth successive defeat for the new captain, Shan Masood.

There was a change in the coaching set-up of the Green Brigade, who hired the former Australian head coach Jason Gillespie for the role but faced a historic Test series defeat at home against Bangladesh. This put more pressure on the home team.

Then came the first Test of this series in Multan, when Pakistan cracked over 550 runs in the first innings of the game but was blown away rapidly after the visiting side smacked them over 800 runs in their lone innings. The home batters struggled in the second inning.

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But those defeats ensured that the board would take some bold decisions around naming a new selection committee, which dropped the two poster boys of the side, Babar Azam and Shaheen Shah Afridi, along with Naseem Shah on the back of their poor performances regularly.

The Pakistan side decided to recycle the same track of the opening Test for the second game, besides bringing back their two spinners, Sajid Khan and Noman Ali, for the last two games, besides handing a reward in the form of debut to Kamran Ghulam, who replaced Babar at number four in the batting order and went on to celebrate his maiden Test century.

Ramiz Raja laughs at Pakistan captain Shan Masood with these words- watch

The former chairman of the PCB, Ramiz Raja, was present at the post-match ceremony where Shan Masood was giving his interview. Given the team will be making their next trip to South Africa for the two-match series, it will be important for the management to bring back quality in the pace department, but Raja wondered if their batters have the technique to bat in those pace and bouncy conditions of the Rainbow nation.  

“Now the focus will be on how you guys will be playing on the seaming conditions in the future (Pointing to the South Africa series), and was that (win) one-off?” The former World Cup-winning member of the Green Brigade expressed during the show.

Pakistan came into the series on the back of their six successive losses. They were demolished in Australia before losing to Bangladesh and then the first game against the Ollie Pope-led side. This gave birth to the second question where Ramiz funnily asked the home captain how he lost six games back-to-back besides questioning his technique of playing the sweep shot.

“How did you achieve these six defeats in a row? Massive one!! I mean, even if people try so hard, it becomes hard for them to achieve six defeats successfully. When will you control these shots (addressing the sweep shot)?” Ramiz Raja addressed during the show.

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Pakistan did a brilliant job in the third Test in Rawalpindi by bundling out the visiting team for just 267 and then putting some quality with the bat, as Saud Shakeel celebrated a century and put on nearly 350 runs in their first innings.

The spinners were excellent with the pace and length of the balls, which eventually blew away the side for just 112 in the second innings and eventually went over the line with nine wickets in hand.