After flourishing on a tired, cracked pitch in the second Test, Pakistan are employing every method at their disposal to get the surface for Thursday’s deciding encounter in Rawalpindi in a similar state – with the aid of a pair of giant windbreaks, two outsized fans and six patio heaters.
The fans were used before the second Test to accelerate the deterioration of the pitch in Multan, with the intention of creating a surface that would offer Pakistan’s spinners maximum turn and grip. The approach proved so successful that two of them, Noman Ali and Sajid Khan, took all 20 English wickets as the home side won by 152 runs to level the series, revelling in conditions that Ben Stokes, the England captain, called “pretty extreme”.
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“It was a team effort,” said Shan Masood, Pakistan’s captain. “I’m happy to give credit to everyone involved in deciding conditions. We have to decide what is best for Pakistan cricket and implement that.”
That Multan pitch had already been played on for the five days of the opening Test whereas the Rawalpindi strip is fresh, and at a ground generally regarded as being hostile to spin. “I would like a turning pitch,” Masood said on Friday. “I don’t know if I’ve seen a turner in Rawalpindi – that’s an issue. We’re still hoping that the sun can play its part and the wicket can be on the drier side. I think the groundsmen are already there working on it.”
The sun is doing its best to help, with clear skies and temperatures in the low 30s forecast in Rawalpindi all week, but the ground staff – led by the Australian Tony Hemming, a former head curator for the ICC in Dubai and author of the book Extreme Stadium Turf: Middle East Conditions – have clearly decided that the weather alone will be insufficient.
On Sunday they had positioned three gas-fuelled patio heaters at each end of the pitch to get the air as hot as possible, a giant fan behind each of them to send the freshly baked air rolling across the surface, and a windbreak at each end to stop it escaping, allowing it to be reheated and recycled. Pakistan will hope not only that three more days of roasting makes the pitch perfect for spin, but also that England don’t spoil everything by winning the toss to give their own spinners the best of conditions.
