Vin­ode Mam­chan

T&T's gi­ant fast bowler Shan­non Gabriel grabbed his first ever five-wick­et haul in Test crick­et but the bats­men could not back him up on the sec­ond day of the sec­ond Test of the Haier Cup se­ries against Pak­istan. This was at the Sheikh Za­yed Sta­di­um in Abu Dhabi, Unit­ed Arab Emi­rates, yes­ter­day.

Pak­istan lost their last six wick­ets for 150 runs and the West In­dies re­spond­ed with 106 for four.

Gabriel bowl­ing with great pace in the heat of Abu Dhabi caused prob­lems for the Pak­ista­nis and was able to re­move bat­ting main­stay Mis­bah ul Haq for 96, which crip­pled the back end of the in­nings. He fin­ished with 5/96 and on the back of this per­for­mance, the West In­dies went out look­ing to en­sure a rare good day of Test crick­et but it was not to be.

The vis­i­tors strug­gled to 106 for four and when play re­sumes to­day, the West In­dies will be look­ing for an­oth­er 147 runs to avoid the fol­low-on.

Af­ter bowl­ing Pak­istan out an hour af­ter lunch for 452, the West In­dies went to the tea break on 27 with­out loss. How­ev­er af­ter the break they lost John­son, who was trapped leg be­fore by Ra­hat Ali for 12, with the score at 27.

Dar­ren Bra­vo opened the bat­ting with John­son be­cause reg­u­lar open­er Kraigg Brath­waite did not stay on the field, as long as he was off for a slight nig­gle. Had he been on for a fur­ther three min­utes be­fore Pak­istan in­nings end­ed, he would have been able to open the bat­ting.

Bra­vo made the most of the op­por­tu­ni­ty with the new hard ball com­ing on and played some pleas­ing shots. The left han­der who has record­ed scores of 87 and 116 in the se­ries so far, looked on course for an­oth­er big knock but was stopped on 43 by Yasir Shah.

The leg spin­ner trapped Bra­vo sweep­ing a straight de­liv­ery, to record his 50th Test wick­et in the desert. Bra­vo faced 85 balls and struck six fours.

Mar­lon Samuels joined Brath­waite who was bat­ting at num­ber three and af­ter an un­sure start against Shah, pro­duced six beau­ti­ful­ly struck fours but just as he was look­ing to close up shop for the day, edged Ra­hat to Aslam for 30. At 106 for three the West In­dies were in a spot of both­er and with­out ad­di­tion to the score, they were in deep trou­ble, as Brath­waite was run out for 21.

Ear­li­er, Pak­istan re­sumed on the bed­time po­si­tion of 304 for four and the ear­ly fo­cus was on Mis­bah get­ting his 11th Test cen­tu­ry but it was not to be. Not look­ing as flu­ent as he did the evening be­fore, the 42-year old looked on as night­watch­man Shah played some au­da­cious shots from the oth­er end. The two added 28 runs be­fore Mis­bah was struck plumb in front of the wick­et for 96 by the per­se­ver­ing Gabriel. He faced 162 balls, hit­ting four fours and two six­es.

Shah, the Pathan was not go­ing to go down won­der­ing and played shot af­ter shot, fi­nal­ly pulling Ja­son Hold­er to De­ven­dra Bishoo at square leg for 23 of 31 balls. Sar­fraz Ahmed came in and in his usu­al busy way, piled on the runs, killing off any thoughts the West In­dies would have en­ter­tained of mak­ing a strong fin­ish.

Play­ing bold shots both sides of the wick­et on a pitch that re­mained ex­cel­lent for bat­ting, Sar­fraz in part­ner­ship with Mo­ham­mad Nawaz took Pak­istan to 401/6 at the lunch break. The lit­tle right han­der was un­beat­en on 45 at the break with Nawaz on 16.

Gabriel must have en­joyed lunch, as he came out fir­ing on all cylin­ders and soon up­root­ed the stumps of Sar­fraz, as he was beat­en for pace. The wick­et­keep­er made 56 of 59 balls with six fours and fell with the score at 412, af­ter a sev­enth-wick­et part­ner­ship of 75 runs with Nawaz.

The left hand­ed Nawaz would fol­low him back in­to the hut soon af­ter bowled by Hold­er for 25. Hold­er grabbed his third wick­et when a well set So­hail Khan fell to a bril­liant catch by John­son but Pak­istan by that time had crossed the 450-run plateau.

Gabriel end­ed the in­nings by get­ting Zul­fiqar Babar caught be­hind by Hope with­out scor­ing.

SCORE­BOARD

West In­dies vs Pak­istan

Pak­istan 1st inns

A Ali b Gabriel 0

S Aslam b Bishoo 6

A Shafiq b Gabriel 68

Y Khan c Chase b Brath­waite 127

M ul Haq lbw Gabriel 96

Y Shah c Bishoo b Hold­er 23

S Ahmed b Gabriel 56

M Nawaz b Hold­er 25

S Khan c John­son b Hold­er 26

Z Babar c Hope b Gabriel 0

R Ali not out 0

Ex­tras: 1b, 15lb, 9nb 25

To­tal: all out 452

Fall of wk­ts: 6, 42, 129, 304, 332, 342, 417, 430, 452, 452.

Bowl­ing: S Gabriel 23.1-1-96-5 (9nb), M Cum­mins 20-1-65-0, J Hold­er 22-8-47-3, D Bishoo 26-0-112-1, R Chase 19-1-80-0, K Brath­waite 9-0-36-1.

WI 1st inns

L John­son lbw Ra­hat 12

D Bra­vo lbw Yasir 43

K Brath­waite run out 21

M Samuels c Aslam b Ra­hat 30

D Bishoo not out 0

J Black­wood not out 0

Ex­tras 0

To­tal for 4 wk­ts 106

Fall of wk­ts: 27, 65, 106, 106.

Bowl­ing: Ra­hat Ali 12-6-31-2, So­hail Khan 9-3-16-0, Zul­fiqar Babar 11-1-29-0, Asad Shafiq 1-0-2-0, Yasir Shah 12-5-28-1.