Former England fast bowler Steve Harmison has praised the England cricket team after their victory against Pakistan.
In particular, Harmison hailed captain Ben Stokes and head coach Brendon McCullum’s bold game plan which led England to victory in a match which saw the third-highest number of points scored in the history of test match cricket.
After big first-leg scores for England and Pakistan, the game looked destined to end in a draw, but that’s not the attitude McCullum and Stokes instilled in this England team, having now won seven out of eight Tests since the New Zealand man took over.
That being said, England decided to declare towards the end of matchday four, which was a risky move but paid off as they picked up a win that particularly impressed Harmison.
“The path [Stokes] happened not just this week but the captaincy in general, he wants to take the positive option and he always tries to win games,” Harmison told talkSPORT.
“There will be bumps in the road, there’s no doubt England will lose a test match, but at this minute his vision of the game is fantastic.
“And, if there’s a bump in the road, the way they put adversity behind them, the red ball team and the white ball team, they’ll bounce right back.
“Although he has a positive mindset like this, it’s a good sign for English cricket.
“We have everyone in the world talking about the England game plan, largely down to Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum.”
England’s task in this Test match was made even more difficult by Rawalpindi’s poor ground, which was described as a ‘road’ by former England cricket captain, Nasser Hussain, as he refused to deteriorate, which made it very difficult to take wickets.
Because of the conditions, Harmison thinks, had it not been for England’s brave tactics, Test cricket could have faced huge criticism for what could have been an embarrassingly boring game.
“If any other team had played Pakistan this week at Rawalpindi Ground, not only would it have been a draw, but it would have been considered the most embarrassing game in cricket,” Harmison said.
“Because it would have been 500 v 500, played 120 v 2 and everyone would have gone for franchise cricket, T20 cricket and white ball cricket all over the world, what is the point of test cricket?
“But, we’re talking about it completely in a different way and a lot of that is thanks to brilliant Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum.”
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