AFTER three days of snail-paced proceedings on a flat pitch, the first Test in Dubai had suddenly come alive on the fourth day when Pakistan embarrassingly slumped to Devendra Bishoo’s deceptive leg-spin to get cheaply dismissed for 123 in their second innings, giving the diminutive West Indian his best Test figures of 8-49.

That gave the tourists some hope as they set about chasing a target of 346 to win the game and surprise Pakistan who at one time had taken a victory for granted after scoring a mammoth 579-3 declared.

Enforcing a follow on or not would obviously in circumstances like this will remain a matter of debate. But it may not have crossed Pakistan skipper Misbah-ul-Haq’s mind when he decided to bat again that his batsmen would perish in such humiliating manner as they did.

However, that is all behind us and for Pakistan the immediate task was to have a quick breakthrough which they did through Mohammad Amir who struck with his first delivery to dismiss Marlon Samuel to provide Pakistan the initiative to go for it.

But matches such as these seldom come your way as a piece of cake. It is important to keep the pressure going to dent the line-up further which is not an easy task when the opposition, knowing their own limitations, start defending stubbornly to take the game to a respectable conclusion which is a draw.

But as I had mentioned in my earlier column, it certainly is never easier to bat under pressure in the last innings of the match. In matter of few deliveries the game could turn on its head.

I must appreciate the fact that despite being the underdogs, the West Indians did show a lot of grit in defying what Pakistan had on offer in a mixture of pace and spin attack.

Amir looked a lot better bowler than the rest and Yasir Shah unwinding his wrist spin kept the batsmen busy but without much luck. Had he bowled with a bit of flight rather than pushing the ball he would have been a lot more threatening.

The ball with which he bowled Roston Chase after he had put on 77 runs with the ever steady Darren Bravo was one on which he should have relied more. Chase went for it and fell.But no discredit to Yasir because his mere presence in the middle to support Amir and Wahab Riaz and Sohail no doubt gave Pakistan the edge that they required to keep the batsmen quiet.

Bravo had put his head down in a controlled innings, reaching a snail-pace fifty. One must commend his realization that he was West Indies’ last hope and rotated the strike sensibly to remain anchored in the middle, frustrating Misbah’s men.

Published in Dawn October 18th, 2016