THE sweet smell of success of the Test win and with it the two-match series will obviously last for some time till Sarfraz Ahmed and his men again come face to face with another set of visitors, the New Zealanders, in a three-match rubber that commences in November.

This annihilation of the Australians in the second Test by a record margin of 371 runs immediately after lunch on the fourth afternoon would now keep Pakistan in a morale boosting mode.

New Zealand I suppose may not be a walk in the park for Pakistan because their attack comprising Trent Boult and Tim Southee have a reputation to be effective on all kinds of pitches while their batting would offer a lot more resistance than we have witnessed from the Australian batsmen.

This Australian outfit was without their star bowlers Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins as well their leading batsmen Steve Smith and David Warner, both of whom have been banned from international cricket for the nasty ball-tampering saga.

To their credit, the Aussies did show their grit and the gumption when up against an ominous defeat in the first Test in which they admirably fought back to save themselves through Usman Khawaja’s fighting century and skipper Tim Paine’s dour resistance at the end.

The grip that Pakistan had over them from the start of the series was tightened even with a greater resolve in the deciding Test in which Pakistan from a mire of destruction brought themselves to a situation from where they seldom faltered.

Fakhar Zaman’s debut innings in difficult circumstances and Mohammad Abbas’s penetrative bowling which brought him a haul of ten wickets were effectively the major factors that influenced the match and the series.

That is besides Sarfraz coming back into swing of things to play a responsible innings, Mohammad Hafeez’s century in the first Test and useful knocks from Asad Shafiq and Babar Azam’s useful knocks too helped besides contribution from Bilal Asif and Yasir Shah who too were able to chip in with valuable wickets when needed.

‘Positives have come out of this series which indeed will keep us in good stead against the Kiwis in the coming series,’ said Pakistan captain Sarfraz after the game.

Earlier, Pakistan’s tour to Ireland and England during the last few months is ample enough justification of their capacity to absorb challenging situations.

You win some and you lose some depending on how you face up to the given situation. Pakistan so far have played with distinction except for their unimpressive display in the Asia Cup.

But future looks bright and talent is in abundance to dig into if we continue to run this game in Pakistan on professional footing on which the recently appointed chairman of the PCB Mr Ehsan Mani is focused on and would also prefer as much for the team to remain well entrenched to face the challenges ahead.

Published in Dawn, October 20th, 2018