ZAMAN AND AHMED COME TO RESCUE AFTER LYON STRIKES
Abu Dhabi, UAE - No one really has a clue how Tests in the UAE go. ‘Slow burners’ seemed to be the conclusion last week. Win the toss, bat first, put up a big score, and dominate.
Nathan Lyon (4-78) made a mockery of that formula in Abu Dhabi. He shredded his way through Pakistan's middle order and turned conventional wisdom on its head.
Just after Pakistan had recovered from the loss of an early wicket and begun to put on a partnership that would reset them on course came a spell any grand old Asian spinmaster would remember in the rocking chair decades on.
Spread across two overs, he took four wickets in six balls as Pakistan tumbled from the relative affluence of 57 for one to the penury of 57 for five within ten minutes.
It didn't only tear up the narrative of the opening session, it may yet be the defining period of this Test series.
If it is not, that would be single-handedly down to one partnership, the one that came right after the carnage.
Debutant Fakhar Zaman (94) and a rejuvenated Sarfraz Ahmed (94) added 147 to lift Pakistan from the doldrums and carry it through to a relatively respectable 282.
At the end of their careers, the innings are likely to rank near the top, and yet both were denied richly-deserved hundreds. Each fell for 94, ensuring that despite their brilliance, the day ended with honours even.
Pakistan finished on a high, though, landing a significant blow to the visitors late on, a diving catch from - who else - Ahmed dismissing last game's hero Usman Khawaja cheaply.
The icing on the cake was Mohammad Abbas trapping nightwatchman Peter Siddle in front middle and leg off the last ball.
For a man who had averaged almost 85 in the UAE previously, there was no foreshadowing what Lyon was about to produce.
The second wicket stand had accumulated 52 hard-fought runs, but Azhar Ali - struggling for form of late - chose unwisely to attack Lyon by charging down the wicket, only to scoop the ball straight into the bowler's hands.
That opened the floodgates. Haris Sohail couldn't keep the first ball he faced down and Travis Head at silly point caught sharply.
An over later, Lyon struck two more bruising blows to the solar plexus of the batting order, sending Asad Shafiq and Babar Azam on their way.
Azam's dismissal could most kindly be described as a brain-freeze, with the youngster charging down the track off just his second delivery, hopelessly beaten by both flight and turn.
The rejuvenation of Ahmed was the defining narrative for Pakistan on the day. Ahmed the counter-puncher strode to the crease a few minutes short of the lunch break while Pakistani batsmen fell over themselves in a hurry to return to the pavilion. And what did he do? He counterpunched.
It was like a return to the halcyon days of 2014-15 for the Pakistan batsmen.
Straight after lunch, he took the attack to Lyon, dancing down the track and carting him over midwicket.
Ahmed and Zaman approached what was a dire situation in a delightfully insouciant way, Ahmed finding the gaps as only a man of his wile can.
After that partnership broke, Ahmed began to noticeably tire as his first Test hundred in three years drew close. A blow on the left elbow by Mitchell Starc didn't help, with the captain requiring lengthy treatment. All of the day's events finally took their toll when, six runs away from the milestone, he tried to launch Labuschagne into the stands. It was a tired shot, and barely cleared the infield, with Siddle holding onto the leading edge at mid-off.