2nd Test England v Pakistan, Old Trafford, 22-26 July

[alfie]

Moeen strikes ...Hafeez snaffled at bat pad...

On his way to a five ...you heard it first here

[budgetmeansbudget]

Blimey Ali makes the break through.

Big partnership coming up.

[hopeforthebest]

That's bad for Stokes and for England. Moeen is unlikely to take up the slack.

Almost every time I malign Moeen's bowling he takes a wicket most often caught on the mid wicket boundary, this time a classic off brake dismissal of Hafeez. Hafeez will kick himself falling for that one.

[budgetmeansbudget]

Moeen strikes ...Hafeez snaffled at bat pad...

On his way to a five ...you heard it first here

I think it may be worth giving him a decent bowl from here. Misbah and Younis look comfortable against our seamers, may take a few liberties with Ali.

[alfie]

Blimey Ali makes the break through.

Big partnership coming up.

Certainly the big one for Pakistan . Two more wickets and they're into the tail.

But these two might be hard to shift.

[hopeforthebest]

Woakes is bowling some excellent deliveries but can't find an edge, could be a long day in the field.

[alfie]

Woakes is bowling some excellent deliveries but can't find an edge, could be a long day in the field.

Indeed he is ! That first ball to Misbah was quite unplayable ...too good to get the edge , alas.

Off now ; unlucky not to have had one or two. Wonder if Broad can summon up something ?

[Dr Cricket]

Surprised bumble not mentioned the crowd loves to mention the crowd when england tour in the winter.

[hopeforthebest]

Ali must take wickets to compensate for his economy rate of almost 7 an over. At that rate Pakistan only have to play the pace carefully and bash Ali around to an historic victory.

[sussexpob]

A nice story , Sussex...

But a little research shows that it actually ended ten overs after tea...after they'd gone off for bad light

Indeed. The game officially ended due to "bad light".... but to quote cricinfo's match report....

Farce briefly threatened to scuff the shine off South Africa's gutsy effort when the umpires halted play for bad light - in near-bright sunshine.

If I can remember the explanation given by Smith commentating about it later, the umpires and both teams agreed if South Africa got to 50 ahead without more than 3 wickets down, then the umpires would engineer the end of the game, and both teams would happily then agree to end it and shake hands on the draw.

It got to about 45 runs ahead and a breif dark spell came over the ground with a passing dark cloud, leading for the umpire to see his chance and quickly offer the light to the batsman despite it being still very light. The batsman and the England team hesitated to accept because it wasnt past the agreed 50 run trigger point, and sent on Alistair Cook to throw down an over because it was deemed to dark for an over of pace. I think Cook got halfway through his over before Smith signalled to Vaughan from the Balcony that they should just end it, and the crowd were left scratching their heads as the players and umpires started shaking hands..... now in glorious sunshine, with the game ending 2 hours early because of bad light.

Obviously both teams simply couldnt just call it off because the paying public might not have been very accepting of the "cant be arsed has stopped play"

[Dr Cricket]

pretty poor way to get out by Younus khan.

[alfie]

Younus just couldn't resist it ! Moeen gets his second...


Come in spinner...

[budgetmeansbudget]

Cook will be relieved now.

[hopeforthebest]

Moeen could end up MOM if this continues. Of course the Pakistan batsmen must cooperate by mind blowing shots. I wonder what percentage of Moeen's wickets are caught off skyiers or in the deep from injudicious shots.

[DiligentDefence]

pretty poor way to get out by Younus khan.

You do have to wonder what he was thinking.