Rehan Ahmed & Ben Duckett Shine assist England Clean Sweep Pakistan: England scored the remaining 55 runs in just 38 minutes of the first session and completed a 3-0 sweep, with Ben Duckett once again introducing himself on a challenging spin track.
After losing the toss in the first two Tests, Babar Azam finally won and decided to bat first. Pakistan scored 304 runs on the scoreboard with the help of captain Babar Azam scoring 78; Agha Salman, 56; Azhar Ali, 45 and Shan Masood, 30 runs.
who played as Imam-ul-Haq was omitted after the opening batsman, suffered an injury? For England, Jack Leach was again the top performer in the bowling department as he took 4-140.
England, in return, registered 354 runs on the board, despite Joe Root getting out on duck. Ollie Pope added another fifty to his name as he scored 51 runs. Harry Brook continued his brilliant form and scored 111 runs.
However, things weren’t looking good for Three Lions, and it looked like they would go behind Pakistan’s score for the first time in the series, but Ben Foakes had other plans as he scored resilient 64 runs.
Rehan Ahmed & Ben Duckett Shine as England Clean Sweep Pakistan: ENG vs PAK – Test Series
But important of all, Mark Wood’s 35 and Ollie Robinson’s 29 runs helped their side very much as they took a 50-run lead. Abrar Ahmad and Nouman Ali took four wickets, with the latter playing his first game of the series.
In the second innings, Pakistan started well but couldn’t capitalise on it. Azhar Ali, playing his last match, got out on a duck. Babar Azam and Saud Shakeel built a partnership, and as soon as it looked like they were back in the game, both batsmen went back to the pavilion, scoring 54 and 53 runs, respectively.
Agha Salman scored 21 runs and took his team’s tally to 216, giving a target of 167. 18-year-old debutant Rehan took five wickets and became the youngest to take five wickets in an inning.
England started well as both openers made an 87-run stand before Zack Crawley lost his wicket after scoring 41 runs. Nightwatchman Rehan scored ten, but Ben Stokes and Ben Duckett made sure not to lose any wickets and chased the total with Ben.
HE scoring 82* and Ben Stokes 35*, with the former becoming the second-top scorer of the series behind Harry Brook.
Stokes gave his verdict on the series by saying: “Perfect.”
“We’ve adapted well, whether that be with bat or ball. Every individual’s confidence in themselves and the people around them is unbelievable. Every person has stood up at some point and put in a match-winning performance.”
“We knew what cricket means to Pakistan, and we knew what it meant to Pakistan for us to be here. The support that we’ve had has been incredible. We felt like the cricket that was played was just being celebrated.
We came here to win, but we also came to play an exciting brand of cricket and get people in to watch. To walk off to a reception like we have at every ground, being the winners over the home team, was very special.” He further said.
It’s worth mentioning that England had only ever won two Test matches in Pakistan before this series but now clinched three consecutive wins on their return after a long absence.
Harry Brook finished the series as the leading run-scorer with 468 in five innings, including three hundred. He was named Player of the Series, as Stokes said about him, “He’s set Pakistan on fire,”.
It is the first time Pakistan’s team have been whitewashed in a Test series on home soil. Moreover, this was England’s ninth win in 10 Test matches since Brendon McCullum and Stokes took over as coach and captain, respectively.
