Fab Four and Fleming on the phone - England's first-Test takeaways
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- Ollia Robinson and Josh Tongue took eight wickets apiece as England routed Pakistan by an innings at Headingley, with Jofra Archer and Gus Atkinson also chipping in after a rusty first innings following The Hundred.
- Joe Root's second tenure as Test captain opened against a weakened Pakistan side missing captain Babar Azam (thumb injury), whose batting was 'brittle,' bowling 'scattergun' and fielding 'shoddy,' per the source.
- Jordan Cox seized his long-awaited Test chance with a patient 73 at number three, deputising for injured Jacob Bethell, but missed converting it into a 'really big score' that would have made him undroppable.
- Jamie Smith showed marked improvement behind the stumps after working with new coaching addition Sarah Taylor, including standing up to Archer's pace, though his Test batting average has now dipped below 40.
- Stephen Fleming, appointed as England's new Test coach last month, will not arrive in the UK until September, meaning he won't take charge of a Test until South Africa at Christmas — though Root said the New Zealander was on daily phone contact during Headingley.
- Pakistan rely heavily on spinning pitches to win Tests, and now head to Lord's, where no over of spin was bowled in England's June win over New Zealand — a surface unlikely to level the playing field.
Why it matters: England had managed only two wins in their previous 10 Tests coming into this match, so the innings victory restores some confidence but the source cautions against over-reading the result given Pakistan's depleted state. Selection questions loom: a top-order logjam is forming around Cox, Bethell and Smith, and England must find a Test-class spinner before the Bangladesh tour in February.
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