Needing to score 373 or bat out a little more than four sessions, Pakistan went to tea 4 for 2
Tea Pakistan 239 and 4 for 2 (Azhar 4*, Haris 0*, Southee 1-0, Boult 1-4) need another 369 runs to beat New Zealand 431 and 180 for 5 dec (Blundell 64, Latham 53, Naseem 3-55)
The new-ball mastery of Trent Boult and Tim Southee has left Pakistan needing a miracle to get anything out of the first Test at Mount Maunganui. New Zealand declared to leave Pakistan five overs to survive before tea on the fourth day, having set them an unlikely target of 373. Within 14 balls of their innings, Pakistan had lost both openers for no score.
Pakistan’s fast bowlers had extracted only minimal help from the conditions even with the new ball, and it had seemed that New Zealand’s attack would have plenty of hard work ahead of them to take 10 fourth-innings wickets. But as they’ve done time and again in recent years, Boult and Southee were able to do plenty with just a little help.
Boult removed Abid Ali with his second ball, getting it to climb disconcertingly from just short of a length, with the pace, the tight line and the left-arm angle leaving the batsman nowhere to go. All he could do from his initial forward press was to fend desperately at the throat-high ball, and glove it through to the keeper.
An over later, it was Southee’s turn to celebrate, after sending back Shan Masood by subtler means. Having swung the previous ball back into the left-hander from around the wicket, he bowled a cross-seam delivery that just kept going with the angle, perhaps even straightening off the deck in the corridor. Never the most extravagant mover of feet, Masood poked at it and edged to first slip.
All morning, the talk had been about how much time New Zealand would want to give themselves to bowl out Pakistan. By tea, all those calculations had been blown away and replaced by the very real prospect of a four-day finish.
More to follow…
Karthik Krishnaswamy is a senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo