PAK vs ENG, 1st Test: Root sets records, Brook rides his luck as England reach 492/3 against Pakistan

Multan: Joe Root and Harry Brook struck unbeaten centuries and shared a 243-run partnership for the fifth wicket on a record-breaking day as England came up with a robust response to reach 492/three against Pakistan at stumps on the third day of the opening Test on the Multan Stadium here on Wednesday.

Root, who had reached 32 on the end of the 2nd day, came up with another majestic effort to continue his superb form from the Lord’s Test against Sri Lanka wherein he struck 100 in both innings, hitting 143 and 103. He became unbeaten at 176 as he helped England offer you an exceptionally good response to Pakistan’s massive first-innings score of 556. Bosch became batting on 141, a blazing effort coming off 173 deliveries, hitting 12 boundaries and one six.

While scoring his third century in three Tests, Root made history as he became the superior scorer for England, breaking the record held by Alistair Cook, going past his score of 12,472 runs that has stood as the record for England since 2018.

It became a day of milestones for Root as he had earlier within the day surged into the pinnacle-six century makers in Test cricket after hitting his Thirty fifth century. He reached the three-figure mark off 187 balls, anchoring the innings with patience while not losing sight of scoring runs.

He had earlier shared a 136-run partnership for the fourth wicket with Ben Duckett, who hammered a seventy five-ball eighty four, hitting Eleven boundaries.

Harry Brook survived a close shave when the ball rolled on to hit the stumps but the bails failed to fall and the England batter made the a lot of the opportunity to score a brilliant century that helped England put themselves in a robust position of their response as still trail the home team by sixty four runs with seven wickets in hand and two days of play remaining.

Brief scores:

Pakistan 556 lead England 492/three in 101 overs (Joe Root 176 not out, Harry Brook 141 not out, Ben Duckett eighty four, Zak Crawley 78; Shaheen Shah Afridi 1-88) by sixty four runs.