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After years as the butt of the cricketing world’s jokes, and after all the false hopes, England had reached number one.
What’s more, they had done it in the form of the game they invented, Test cricket, the one where their humiliations have been most pronounced.
In their tour to Australia, the side which had so often wilted looked utterly invincible; to say they simply beat Australia would be to drastically short change them. Then in their own summer they mopped up an admittedly ailing Indian side 4-0. With that, they had reached the top of the world rankings.
So who would have thought that an innocuous tour to the Middle East to play Pakistan would bring them undone?
Matches in places like Abu Dhabi and Dubai are usually colourless affairs played in front of vacant stadiums against flimsy Pakistan outfits. If this was what England expected, they, like most of us, made a staggering miscalculation.
Pakistan have not beaten England 3-0 because England were inept. They did not crush them. They simply played better cricket in the clutch moments of each match. Against all likelihood, this is a Pakistan side of great quality and great spirit, and one which should give hope to any sportsmen or sporting team which thinks the game is up.
Let’s have a look at what Pakistan have seen in the last few years.
Going back a decade and a bit, there was Salim Malik. Captain of his country, quality player, fixing matches. Despite all the trials which Malik’s sins brought to his nation in the mid-1990s, Pakistan clambered their way into the final of the 1999 World Cup.
Shane Warne and his associates knocked them over for 132, and Australia got the runs in a trot. Far from being heroes for their rise to the final, the Pakistan players returned home to see effigies of themselves burned for their defeat.
After that, threats of terrorism meant that opposing teams wouldn’t play in Pakistan anymore. They still don’t, hence the smattering of matches in the United Arab Emirates and the like. Pakistan has effectively become a black hole, where international cricket will no longer venture.
Then there was the chaos of 2007, one of the saddest and most mysterious incidents in the game’s history. Pakistan are knocked out by Ireland of all teams, and the next morning coach Bob Woolmer is found dead in his hotel room. Still nobody knows what happened to him. The stink around Pakistan cricket was suddenly even more rancid.
Then there was spot fixing. Mohammed Asif was a fine bowler. Though undoubtedly mercurial, when in the right form he was the equal of any other bowler in the world with his swing and seam. Salman Butt was a bold batsmen and leader, establishing him despite being young for the captaincy. Mohammed Aamer was a blindingly bright prospect. On his tour to Australia in 2009/10 his papers were marked: this young man was going to be a superstar.
I use the past tense in each of these instances and the players in question may never play again, and in my view they shouldn’t be allowed back. Their greed showed a disrespect for the game which hurt all cricket fans.
But imagine what it did to those in Pakistan. This was the final indignity for a nation pummelled by ignominy, mystery and scandal in the past two decades.
Yet they have picked themselves up. They have come to the United Arab Emirates, with a new captain, a new spine for their team and a new desire. And they have played superb cricket.
Azhar Ali’s 157 from 442 balls in the third test represents this perfectly. Think back to the way Pakistan squandered a similar winning position in Sydney in 2010, and the shots played by the likes of Umar Akmal. Now think of Azhar Ali, standing in front of a nearly empty ground in a dead-rubber game showing pride in his wicket, and a determination to put his team in position to win the game.
Pakistan have shown a strength of national character which we should never have doubted.
We must hope that this band of players stick together, and that Pakistan can get the clear air needed to return to their rightful position as a powerful and formidable cricketing nation.
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