Cricket-Match-Special ... A forum for discussion

Under lockdown rules.

Start today in Manchester then two Tests in Southampton.

Followed by a couple of T20s.

Will England start dadly?

Will Pakistan be mercurial?

These are the sides Cricinfo is predicting.

1 Dom Sibley, 2 Rory Burns, 3 Joe Root (capt), 4 Ben Stokes, 5 Ollie Pope, 6 Jos Buttler (wk), 7 Sam Curran/Chris Woakes, 8 Dom Bess, 9 Stuart Broad, 10 Mark Wood/Jofra Archer, 11 James Anderson

1 Shan Masood, 2 Abid Ali, 3 Azhar Ali (capt), 4 Babar Azam, 5 Asad Shafiq, 6 Fawad Alam/Shadab Khan, 7 Mohammad Rizwan(wk), 8 Yasir Shah, 9 Shaheen Afridi, 10 Mohammad Abbas, 11 Naseem Shah

Familiar touring side.

TV umpires will call no balls. So there might be more of them.

Promises to be an interesting series, as Pakistan should bat a lot better than the Windies

Archer lucky to get a game.

Shadab at six? Is he an all rounder?

1 Dom Sibley, 2 Rory Burns, 3 Joe Root (capt), 4 Ben Stokes, 5 Ollie Pope, 6 Jos Buttler (wk), 7 Chris Woakes, 8 Dom Bess, 9 Stuart Broad, 10 Jofra Archer, 11 James Anderson

1 Shan Masood, 2 Abid Ali, 3 Azhar Ali (capt), 4 Babar Azam, 5 Asad Shafiq, 6 Shadab Khan, 7 Mohammad Rizwan(wk), 8 Yasir Shah, 9 Shaheen Afridi, 10 Mohammad Abbas, 11 Naseem Shah

Pakistan win the toss and bat.

Might be a good toss to win. Depends how this innings goes , I guess.

Old Trafford is supposed to be good for spinners : but it's been the pace men who have done the damage recently. Two leggies might be a bit different...

With Stokes apparently still not 100% , England probably had to play five bowlers. Does leave them potentially vulnerable though , if Pakistan score well. Tail is a bit long , given Woakes can't buy a run these days.

Anderson beating the bat a lot ; but no real alarms yet for Pakistan.

Pakistan have a similar bat/ball balance I think.

Anderson unlucky.

mikesiva wrote:Archer lucky to get a game.

Shadab at six? Is he an all rounder?

He batted at 7 in 2018 when he was here, and scored a couple of 50s.

First wicekt for Archer, castled Abid

Archer strikes!

Going to be interesting to see how long Azhar Ali lasts; his record outside UAE is nothing to write home about, and hes coming off 2 years of pretty horrendous form. England will really want to open those wounds of past batting failures and get him early now, really dont want to give him a score and for him to gain confidence

Didn't last long. Out for a duck to Woakes.

Not much surpise. Hes nearly 36, another bad series here and he might want to call it a day.

Not bad for either side. Pakistan have seen off the new ball with only two down. England have a couple of wickets for not many runs.

Babar gets his half century!