Pakistan vs England: Cook, Root dig deep as England post 210/2 at tea
Alastair Cook celebrates his hundred on Friday. (Photo: AP)
Alastair Cook celebrates his hundred on Friday. (Photo: AP)
Alastair Cook celebrated his 50th Test as England captain with a fluent century that helped his team reach 210/2 at tea in the second Test against Pakistan on Friday.
Joe Root (87 not out) learnt quickly from his two reckless dismissals in the first Test defeat at Lord’s last week and put on 185 with Cook before Mohmmad Amir clean bowled the England captain for 105 on the stroke of the interval.
Cook, who won the toss and elected to bat on easy-paced wicket, hit 15 fours in nearly four hours as both batsmen negated Pakistan’s spin threat of Yasir Shah, who is still seeking his first wicket after bowling 18 overs.
Earlier, Cook and Root overcame the early loss of Alex Hales to leave England well-placed on 95/1 at lunch. Cook, who marked his 50th Test as England captain by winning the toss, was 40 not out and Root unbeaten on 41, with the hosts looking to bounce back from losing last week’s first Test at Lord’s.
England’s second-wicket partnership was so far worth 70 runs after Hales was bowled by a superb Mohammad Amir delivery for 10.
Predictably, there were a few jeers as Amir prepared to bowl the first ball of the match.
There were also some shouts of -"No-ball!-", a reference to the 2010 spot-fixing controversy at Lord’s which saw Amir given a five-year ban for deliberately over-stepping as part of a newspaper betting sting.
Amir, who took the last wicket in Pakistan’s win in the first of this four-Test series, saw his first and second deliveries edged through gully for four by Cook. Cook also seized on a short and wide Rahat Ali delivery which he cut for four.
Scoreboard (At tea) England (1st innings): A. Cook b Amir 105, A. Hales b Amir 10, J. Root (batting) 87. Extras: (lb3, w3, nb2) 8. Total: (for 2 wkts, in 55.4 overs) 210. FoW: 1-25, 2-210. Bowling: Amir 12.4-2-48-2, Ali 12-1-44-0, Riaz 11-1-37-0, Yasir 18-3-69-0, Azhar 2-0-9-0.