A brilliant team performance from England

BY DILLINGER
(CRICKETWINDIES)That was a brilliant team performance from England. They are really starting to gel together.

Teams with a 100+ first innings lead have a microscopic 3% losing percentage. The odds were strongly stacked against England, especially after being rattled out for under 300 in the first innings. Woakes picking up the wicket of Azhar Ali on the final ball of the second day really changed this match.

England's bowlers were fantastic after lunch. Jimmy and Mo really turned the screws bowling in tandem. Jimmy got the ball reversing and Mo had the ball drifting. Once they removed Azhar and Younis, the rest of the seamers tore through Pakistan's vulnerable middle order. Broad, Finn and Woakes were disciplined with their lines and the pressure took its toll.

This will be a disheartening loss for Pakistan. They were cruising at the lunch interval with only one wicket down and still an outside chance to pull of an unlikely win. Despite the loss, Pakistan will take heart with the performance from Sami Aslam. They have found themselves a genuine opening batsman. The difference between Sami Aslam and Shan Masood is night and day. Young Sami looked very assured and organized. He knows where his off stump is and showed good judgement (his eventual dismissal excepted). He has big potential.

I've said a few times now in the past that England often flatter to deceive, and just when you think things are going well they will pull out a poor performance that puts them back to square one again. As an Englishman myself, I think the 'if anything can go wrong it will' mentality is bred into me and as soon as things start to go wrong for the England cricket team (or for any England team in any sport) the we automatically throw in the towel.

Maybe bow it's time we started to believe more in this team as recently they have showed that they can come back and win or draw when all looks lost, and this is another one of them times.