http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Misbah-ul-Haq-c1972 hits 50 and ensures drawn second Test
A thoroughly stubborn but vital unbeaten 58 by Pakistani captain Misbah-ul-Haq ensured that the Pakistanis had managed to stave off defeat on the fifth and the final day of the second test match played
at Abu Dhabi. The series ended 0-0.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/South-Africa-c757 had ended the previous day on 173/4 and they batted a further of six overs to add 30 runs and set the Pakistani side a target of 354 runs off the 82 possible overs.
While the target was always going to be difficult to achieve, the opening pair of Taufeeq Umar and Mohammad Hafeez ensured that there were no early hiccups and the side went into lunch for no loss. The opening
partnership had added 66 in the 19 overs and some optimists were raising hopes of a Pakistani win if the side was able to keep their wickets intact.
As it turned out, it was a spell of eight balls after lunch that totally changed things around for the South African side and brought them back into the game. Umar was first dismissed by http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Johan-Botha-c67173, lbw,
and this was followed by a Paul Harris over that saw both Hafeez and Younis Khan sent back for no further addition.
66/0 at lunch had become 66/3 and the home team were looking down the barrel.
It was at this stage that Misbah was joined by Azhar Ali and the pair went about their business slowly. There weren’t too many chances given and the slow nature of the track meant that the bowlers weren’t
able to extract too much from the wicket.
Botha and Harris bowled 40 of the total of 67 overs bowled in the innings, but apart from these initial breakthroughs, they were not able to do much. Azhar, who has had an excellent series with three successive
half centuries was dour in his defense and made 28 off 135 balls. There were long passages of no runs scored during the innings as the side seemed to have pulled their shutters down long before the end of the game.
Misbah did hit 10 boundaries in his innings of 58 but a draw was always on the cards once the Pakistani side went into tea at 127/3.
The match was called off with one hour still to go. http://www.senore.com/Cricket/AB-de-Villiers-c887 won the man of the match award for his unbeaten 278 while Jacques Kallis was named the man of the series.
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