England 96 for 1 (Crawley 64*, Root 32*) trail Pakistan 556 (Masood 151, Salman 104*, Shafique 102, Shakeel 82, Leach 3-160) by 460 runs
The riposte, as it often does, came from Crawley, back in the side after missing the Sri Lanka series with a broken finger. He slashed his sixth ball, from Shaheen Afridi, to the boundary and did the same to Naseem in the following over, before taking Afridi for a brace of fours to end the seamer’s opening spell. That led to the early introduction of spin – and another statement of intent from Crawley, as Abrar’s first over went for 11.
Crawley brought up England’s 50 in the 11th, hauling Abrar for through midwicket for another boundary, and he continued to go after Pakistan’s legspinner, who claimed 11 wickets as a debutant on the same ground against England two years ago. Two more fours down the ground left Abrar with opening figures of 4-0-31-0, before a ninth boundary, clipped through midwicket off Naseem, took Crawley to a 55-ball half-century.
Beyond a trio of optimistic lbw appeals, there was little to encourage Pakistan’s attack – as had been the case for England – with Root slipstreaming Crawley to the close in an unbroken partnership worth 92.