The second afternoon of last week’s astonishing first Test in Multan contained an easily forgotten moment – and it helped explain why England are so keen on Shoaib Bashir.
Pakistan’s No 5 Saud Shakeel had ground his way to 82 when Bashir produced the off-spinner’s dream: a ball that pitched outside the left-hander’s leg stump, before turning across him to take the edge. Joe Root did the rest at slip.
At the time, Shakeel’s dismissal felt neither here nor there: it left Pakistan 450 for seven, and England facing a struggle to get anything out of the game. When they spectacularly overturned that theory during the next couple of days, Bashir’s Ball of the Test – and that’s what it was – faded in the memory.
Then there was the performance of Jack Leach, ousted by Bashir as England’s first-choice spinner during last winter’s tour of India, but still ahead of him in the pecking-order at Somerset – a topsy-turvy arrangement typical of Bazball. And while Leach wrapped up England’s win with match figures of seven for 190, Bashir finished with one for 156. It felt almost impolite to mention the contrast.
Bashir’s rapid elevation to Test cricket has been told often enough: Ben Stokes watched highlights on social media, and cheerfully ignored his first-class bowling average of 67. Again, very Bazball.
England took a gamble on Shoaib Bashir (pictured) earlier this year when they went to India
He bowled a brilliant delivery to dismiss Saud Shakeel in last week’s first Test win over Pakistan
Deliveries like the one to Shakeel show why captain Ben Stokes has so much faith in Bashir
And anyone in the England set-up will tell you he’s the real deal. Last month, managing director Rob Key told Mail Sport: ‘You see someone getting better and better. It wouldn’t take you long to work out he can deliver a ball. But he learns as well. He’s progressing beautifully. He’s nowhere near maximising his potential.’
And on Sunday, bowling consultant Jimmy Anderson was singing from a similar hymn sheet: ‘He gets better every time he plays. He works so hard at his game, and thinks a lot about it. We have seen what he can do already and the more he plays the better he will get. It is our job as coaches and players round him to just keep giving him that confidence and freedom to bowl how he can.’
This is all good to hear, but it’s also fair to ask whether England’s gamble will pay off. Essentially, they believe his high release point makes him a better bet to flourish in all conditions than the shorter Leach. Bashir, they argue, has bounce and dip built into his physique, and ought to be harder to take to the cleaners, as Leach has been by India’s Rishabh Pant, and Australia’s David Warner and Travis Head during the first Test at Brisbane in 2021-22.
It felt instructive when, speaking before the first Test, Ollie Pope described Leach as ‘someone who puts the team first. He’s put Bash first as well – he’s been awesome for him.’ Awesome, perhaps, but is that Leach’s job?
Back in July, when Bashir hurried England to victory on the fourth evening of the second Test against West Indies at Trent Bridge, where his set-up of Jason Holder in particular was a thing of beauty, the bandwagon was gathering pace.
Yet his record since then has reverted to his pre-Test numbers. Between that game in Nottingham and the start of this morning’s second Test in Multan, he took nine wickets for England at more than 60 each.
Jimmy Anderson (left) and Brendon McCullum (right) are convinced Bashir is the real deal
But Jack Leach (pictured) comprehensively outbowled him in the first Test, and doubts remain over whether Bashir is truly a stronger option than the 33-year-old spinner moving forward
That sequence has included more than one wicket in an innings only once, when he bowled well to Sri Lanka on the first day at Old Trafford, returning figures of 23-4-55-3. Recognising their passivity, the Sri Lankans attacked him second time round: 20-0-77-0. It was alarming how easily they succeeded.
That, though, is the deal: Bashir, who turned 21 on Sunday, is the definitive work in progress. He will, we are told, get better. But can he improve quickly enough to avoid being cannon fodder in Australia, where only the best finger-spinners thrive?
Take Nathan Lyon, who aims wide of off stump, thereby challenging both edges of the right-hander’s bat, and has 530 Test wickets. Last week in Multan, perhaps not helped by Pope’s field placings, Bashir repeatedly slipped down leg. As Geoff Boycott keeps saying, he should study videos of Lyon.
Graeme Swann used to regard his role as two-fold: defend in the first innings, attack in the second. As things stand, Bashir lacks the control to do the first, yet England are treating him as if the opposite is the case.
By lunch on the first day of the first Test against Pakistan, England had confirmed their hierarchy. Bashir had bowled six variable overs for 42, Leach just one, costing a single. By tea, Bashir had none for 59 from 11, Leach none for 22 from nine. The No 1 spinner was offering his captain less than the No 2.
And if Leach defended better than Bashir in the first innings, he attacked better in the second: 6.5-1-30-4 compared with Bashir’s 6-0-32-0. It was lost on no one that Ben Stokes turned to Leach before Bashir earlier today – the first morning of the second Test – and no great surprise when Leach made the two early breakthroughs.
England and McCullum will continue to stick with Bashir, and the young bowler could well go on to become the greatest success story of the Bazball era if he can find more consistency
Despite that, and other evidence, England have been urging Bashir front and centre. In this summer’s county championship, he took four wickets for Somerset at 94 apiece. Leach finished with 45 at 22, and even 18-year-old Archie Vaughan picked up 15 at 20 with his off-breaks (and scored 236 runs at 33). And when Bashir went on loan to Worcestershire, Surrey’s Dan Lawrence hammered him for 38 in an over.
One day, we may look back and wonder why we were fretting. Bashir may have tightened up his line, taken 300 Test wickets, and rubbed shoulders with Swann, Derek Underwood and Jim Laker. He could become one of the great stories in sport.
For the moment, they have a year to turn him into the bowler they need for Australia, where the scrutiny will be like nothing he has ever experienced, and the crowds quick to seize on a spinner who can’t bat and drops catches.
If England and Bashir succeed, it may just be Bazball’s greatest story yet.
The Multan brick-thrower!
There is another international venue in Multan, the Ibn-e-Qasim Bagh Stadium, but it has been used for only one Test and six one-day internationals, and it has long fallen into disrepair. Yet, against West Indies in 1980-81, it played hosts to one of the most astonishing vignettes in the history of Test cricket.
West Indies fast bowler Sylvester Clarke (pictured) threw a brick into the crowd when his nation faced Pakistan in Multan in 1980-81
On the second day of the fourth Test of a very long tour, provoked by fruit-throwing spectators, West Indies fast bowler Sylvester Clarke picked up a brick and hurled it into the crowd. It hit a spectator on the head, sending him to hospital, where he was visited by a contrite Clarke, along with West Indies tour manager Jackie Hendricks.
Wisden called Clarke’s actions ‘disgraceful’, adding: ‘The spectators erupted and play was held up for twenty-five minutes until Kallicharran appealed to the crowd on bended knee to restore order.’ Next time you question player behaviour, think of Sylvester Clarke.
Root is England’s ultimate ambassador
Joe Root did the media rounds on the fourth evening of the first Test, moving around the boundary from the BBC to Sky to a couple of members of the written press.
He looked exhausted after his 262, keen to collapse in a heap. But when the local scorer stepped in to ask him to sign his book and pose for a photo, he charmingly obliged.
It may not sound like much, but I’ve seen cricketers in similar circumstances react less graciously. And it was a reminder that, on tour, these players never stop being ambassadors.
Joe Root looked exhausted as he walked off after his 262 last week, but still did his media duties and posed for photos with a local scorer following his sensational double century
India’s record breakers
Two weeks ago, this column suggested India had finally woken up to their potential after scoring at eight an over to set up a Test win over Bangladesh in Kanpur.
On Saturday in Hyderabad, they made 297 for six in a T20 game against the same opponents – a record between Test nations. The years ahead could be frightening.