Pakistan has increased attempts to prepare a spinning pitch for their Test series decider against England, employing high-capacity fans, outdoor heaters, and, windbreakers in a bid to dry out the surface at Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium.
In the wake of losing by innings on a lifeless pitch in the first Test in Multan, Pakistan made a groundbreaking move and was selected to recycle the same strip for a second match in a row. The strategy worked out elegantly after they won the toss, with spinners Noman Ali and Sajid Khan sharing all 20 wickets as England were bowled out for just 144 in their final innings.
Rawalpindi is usually among the smoothest pitches in Test cricket, with slight support for spinners. Mehidy Hasan Miraz, the Bangladesh offspinner, took 10 wickets in their 2-0 series win in Rawalpindi last month, though, after the menu started hosting Tests in 2019, spinners have averaged approximately 50 runs per wicket there.
Seam bowlers have excelled in performance, taking a wicket every 34 runs, with the average assisted by a Test against South Africa in January 2021. On a surface that extended aid to the seamers throughout the game, Shaheen Afridi and Hasan Ali took nine of South Africa’s ten wickets in the fourth innings, eight of them on the final day. All four innings registered scores between 200 and 300, and the PCB has previously considered that the gold standard for a Pindi Test wicket. Â
Read more: Mohammad Rizwan set to be new captain of Pakistan’s ODI and T20I teams
Those days are decidedly in the past, though. Shan Masood, Pakistan’s captain, made clear after their 152-run victory in the second Test in Multan that he would like to see an uncharacteristic Rawalpindi pitch for the decider, which starts on Thursday. England is well-prepared for another turner, with their head coach Brendon McCullum forecasting the surface would be “the antithesis of a green seamer”.
On Sunday, ground staff had arranged three large heaters and an industrial-sized fan at each end of the pitch, removing moisture out of it with hot air, with a windbreak at each end to conserve heat. Pakistan’s players and staff effectively evaluated the surface when they trained on Monday morning, at which stage only the fans remained. It continued to dehydrate in the afternoon heat.
Remarkably, the Test strip is one of only three that has been going diagonally across the square; the other two are practice strips, one on each side of the pitch. England’s seamers used a dry, abrasive square to get the ball reverse-swinging in the second Test in Multan, but a grassy square and a lush outfield may make that more complicated this week.
England did not train on Monday and are open-minded ahead of their session on Tuesday. “I don’t know what to expect. I haven’t looked anything,” Jack Leach, who is the leading wicket-taker in the series, claimed to the BBC. “We will go to training and have a glance at it. I feel quite clear about what I’m doing and that does not truly transform depending on the wicket. We will encounter what it is.”