England will wake up on Saturday needing 130 runs, but that number barely scratches the surface of what unfolded under the Edgbaston lights.
This was supposed to be a procession. Instead, a 21-year-old debutant at number nine ripped up the script, lit up a flat series and left England’s new regime with more questions than they would have expected at 0-2 up.
A debutant who refused to go quietly
Pakistan were 318-8, still two runs behind and running on fumes. The tour had been chaotic, the batting brittle, the series effectively gone. It felt like a long, slow walk to the inevitable.
Then came Razaullah.
What followed was not resistance in the traditional, backs-to-the-wall sense. It was an onslaught. Razaullah’s 81 from 63 balls was raw, fearless and utterly disruptive. He launched nine sixes – equalling Ben Stokes’ record for the most in a Test innings in England – and turned a modest recovery into a statement.
He didn’t do it alone. With Muhammad Abbas for company, Pakistan’s number nine dragged the match into a different gear. The pair added 121 for the eighth wicket, Abbas chipping in 42 and two sixes of his own, a tailender suddenly batting like a man who had been watching the carnage from the non-striker’s end and decided he rather liked the look of it.
England frayed. Lengths disappeared. Plans dissolved. The ball kept vanishing into the stands.
Razaullah finally went in suitably dramatic fashion, stumped off Dan Lawrence after one last flurry. By then Pakistan had surged to 449, a lead of 316 wiped out and replaced with a target that, while modest, now carries the weight of pressure and momentum.
Edgbaston rose to him. A debutant, a late call-up among seven changes for this Test, walked off like a man who had just introduced himself to world cricket.
From shambles to substance
This has been, by any measure, a shambolic tour for Pakistan. Bowled out for 133 on day one here, reduced to 0-2 in their second innings, they were on course for another meek surrender. Bad weather on Thursday was almost all that stopped England finishing the job inside two days.
Friday was different. Pakistan, for the first time in the series, looked like a Test side that had found its spine.
Shan Masood and Azan Awais began the repair job, stretching their overnight third-wicket stand to 125. Awais, just 21, played with timing through the off side and reached 59 before feathering Lawrence’s off-spin down the leg side. It was a soft dismissal, but by then he had done something no Pakistan batter had managed all series: stay long enough to change the mood.
Masood, calm and organised, went further. He added another 89 with Babar Azam, guiding Pakistan from survival to something more ambitious. On 95, he was denied a century in the country where he went to school by a moment of brilliance – Lawrence again, this time at gully, flinging out one hand to pluck a Gus Atkinson delivery from the air.
Babar’s 76 was all class: crisp drives, precise cuts, the familiar poise. England, sensing the need for something different, went to a short-ball plan either side of tea. The change unsettled him. A Josh Tongue bouncer climbed, Babar fended, and the catch went. At that point, a three-day finish looked back on the cards.
Razaullah had other ideas.
‘Razball’ and a stand that changed everything
Once the top order had shown discipline, the tail brought chaos. This was not slogging in the dark; it was calculated hitting, built on a clear decision that survival alone was pointless.
Razaullah first impressed with the ball in England’s first innings, using his pace to hint at a future as a proper all-rounder. With the bat, he went from curiosity to headline act in an hour.
He equalled Tim Southee’s record for the most sixes by a Test debutant in a single innings. Atkinson was launched into the Edgbaston building site, three times in one over. Jofra Archer, usually the intimidator, watched two deliveries sail back over his head for six. The sound off the bat was different, the reaction in the Hollies Stand instant.
Abbas joined the fun. He reverse-swept Lawrence, then muscled Ollie Robinson over cow corner twice. For a team that had not previously passed 200 or lasted 51 overs in this series, Pakistan suddenly looked like a side that had been waiting all tour to exhale.
As the light faded, it seemed the eighth-wicket pair might even make it to the close. Tongue finally broke them, Abbas poking to point, but the damage had been done.
The finish was breathless. Razaullah cracked Lawrence for his record-equalling ninth six, overturned an lbw decision to huge cheers, then overbalanced and was stumped, the innings ending with the kind of dismissal that belongs to innings like this – high-risk, high-theatre.
He left to a rapturous ovation, a new star minted in the space of a session.
England’s control finally cracks
For most of this series, England’s bowlers have operated on cruise control. Conditions helpful, opposition brittle, captaincy largely unchallenged. On Friday evening, that changed.
Up to the point where Babar fell, England’s work had been solid. When the ball moved, they held their length. When it stopped, they went short at the right moments and took sharp chances. Pakistan’s improvement owed more to their own application than any glaring drop-off in England’s standards.
Once Razaullah and Abbas came together, the discipline vanished. Fields scattered to the rope for bouncers, then crept in as bowlers tried to go full and straight, only to miss their mark or find resolute defence. The sense of control that has defined this new regime evaporated.
Robinson, in the form of his life this summer, somehow did not take the second new ball. Lawrence did. Joe Root’s decision raised eyebrows and, as Razaullah kept swinging, those eyebrows only climbed higher. Archer’s frustration was visible. Root even left the field briefly as his attack laboured.
By the end, England were reduced to Atkinson banging in bouncers with eight men patrolling the boundary. It looked less like a plan and more like a plea.
The late wickets – Abbas, then Razaullah – brought relief and a touch of order. England walked off chastened but still favourites, 130 the asking price for a 3-0 clean sweep.
A chase with edge
England should get them. On paper, 130 is a small chase for a batting line-up that piled up 453 in the first innings, with Harry Brook (75), Jamie Smith (69), Lawrence (65), Emilio Gay (60) and Robinson (50) all contributing.
But Test cricket is rarely about the number alone.
Pakistan, dismissed for 133 on day one and twice on the ropes since, have finally found some fight. They have a total to defend, a crowd to quieten and a new hero to rally around. The Hollies Stand, subdued for much of the first two days, came alive on Friday; it will have its say again.
England remain on course for their sweep. Pakistan, after three days of chaos and defiance, have ensured they will at least have to earn it.
