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Royals’ opening pair has been in red-hot form, but they come up against a Titans attack that has been bossing the powerplay. Who will come out on top?

Sreshth Shah15-Apr-20235:30

Bishop: Titans should bowl Rashid to Buttler straight away

Big Picture – Rematch of the IPL 2022 final

Gujarat Titans and Rajasthan Royals meet for the first time this season, following wins that should’ve been more clinical than they were. Rahul Tewatia’s scoop off Sam Curran gave a nervy Titans points against Punjab Kings while Sandeep Sharma held his nerve to clinch victory against MS Dhoni and Chennai Super Kings. They’d both want to be more ruthless on Sunday.Royals have had all their success setting sizeable totals and defending them. Against Super Kings, they became the first team to successfully defend a sub-190 score, earning their third bat-first win in four games. Titans meanwhile have put together chases in a calculative manner, with a deep batting line-up, and have lost just once chasing in 12 games since the start of IPL 2022.Rashid Khan could play a big role. Jos Buttler (strike rate 69 and four dismissals in 11 innings), Sanju Samson (strike rate 98) and Shimron Hetmyer (four dismissals) struggle against him. But Titans are not wholly dependent on Rashid either. Since the start of IPL 2022, no team has taken more powerplay wickets (35) than Titans with Mohammed Shami and Alzarri Joseph proving difficult to handle this year too. Shubman Gill, Sai Sudharsan, Vijay Shankar and David Miller have shown form as well.Royals will want their openers to set the tone. No pair this season has scored more runs in partnership quicker (194 runs at a strike rate of 202) or hit more powerplay boundaries than Buttler and Yashasvi Jaiswal (19 apiece). They also do exceedingly well against spinners, averaging 72 runs per wicket, the best (by far) among the 10 teams. Their experienced bowling has been exceptional too. R Ashwin (6.4) and Trent Boult (7.3) are among the tidiest bowlers in terms of economy this season while Yuzvendra Chahal (10 wickets) is an early purple cap contender.The rematch of the IPL 2022 final promises to be a high-quality affair between in-form teams. The perfect way to end week two of IPL 2023.

Form guide (most recent match first)

Titans: WLWW
Royals: WWLW

Team news – All eyes on Trent Boult

Boult was rested due to a “small niggle” in their last game. If he returns, then fellow pacer Kuldeep Sen gets benched (and perhaps Adam Zampa makes way on the overseas roster).Titans have no injury concerns.

Toss and Impact Player strategy

Based on who bats and who bowls, Dhruv Jurel and Yuzvendra Chahal are likely to be the Impact Player swaps for Royals. Titans could use Josh Little and Vijay Shankar similarly.Gujarat Titans
Bat-first XI (possible): 1 Wriddhiman Saha (wk), 2 Shubman Gill, 3 Sai Sudharsan, 4 Hardik Pandya, 5 Vijay Shankar, 6 David Miller, 7 Rahul Tewatia, 8 Rashid Khan, 9 Mohammed Shami, 10 Mohit Sharma, 11 Alzarri Joseph.Bowl-first XI (possible): 1 Wriddhiman Saha (wk), 2 Shubman Gill, 3 Hardik Pandya, 4 Vijay Shankar, 5 David Miller, 6 Rahul Tewatia, 7 Mohammed Shami, 8 Josh Little, 9 Rashid Khan, 10 Mohit Sharma, 11 Alzarri Joseph.Rajasthan Royals
Bat-first XI (possible): 1 Yashasvi Jaiswal, 2 Jos Buttler, 3 Devdutt Padikkal/Riyan Parag, 4 Sanju Samson (capt, wk), 5 Shimron Hetmyer, 6 Dhruv Jurel, 7 Jason Holder, 8 R Ashwin, 9 Sandeep Sharma, 10 Trent Boult/Adam Zampa, 11 Kuldeep Sen.Bowl-first XI (possible): 1 Jos Buttler, 2 Yashasvi Jaiswal, 3 Sanju Samson (capt, wk), 4 Shimron Hetmyer, 5 Jason Holder, 6 Devdutt Padikkal/Riyan Parag, 7 R Ashwin, 8 Sandeep Sharma, 9 Yuzvendra Chahal, 10 Trent Boult/Adam Zampa, 11 Kuldeep Sen.

Pitch and conditions

Since IPL 2021, only twice in nine occasions has a team successfully defended in Ahmedabad. The average first-innings winning score in this period is 175.Sunday evening will be hot, with temperatures around 35 degrees C.

Stats that matter

• Shubman Gill is not fluent against Boult or Chahal. He has a strike rate of 98 against the pacer and 104 against the spinner.
• Sanju Samson enjoys facing Mohammed Shami: scoring 54 runs in 28 balls with only one dismissal.
• Shimron Hetmyer has faced Shami five times in T20s. He’s been dismissed by Shami on four of those occasions.
• Hardik Pandya has been out for single digits in all his three innings this season.
• David Miller has been among the best IPL chasers recently. Since the start of IPL 2022, he has been out only twice in 11 innings in a chase. He averages 184 with a strike rate of 151 batting second in that period.

Henriques, Silk fifties help Sixers chase down 134 with 3.4 overs to spare in Sydney derby; Abbott takes three for nine

AAP08-Jan-2023Sydney Sixers stalwarts Sean Abbott, Moises Henriques and Jordan Silk starred as their side moved to the top of the BBL ladder with a seven-wicket win over Sydney Thunder.Paceman Abbott spearheaded a strong Sixers bowling effort as they restricted Thunder to 133 for eight in their Sydney Smash derby at Sydney Showground Stadium.Sixers slumped to 25 for three after four overs, but middle-order linchpins Silk and Henriques took control of the game with an unbroken fourth-wicket stand of 109 off 75 balls.Silk (59 off 42) and Henriques (53 off 38) displayed their experience, working the ball into gaps for singles and hitting the occasional boundary when the Thunder bowlers erred.It was Silk’s first BBL 50 of the season and Henriques’ highest score in this season’s campaign.The win, which was achieved with 3.4 overs left, lifted the Sixers above the Scorchers to first, though Perth have two games in hand. Thunder, who lost for the first time five games, dropped to fourth on net run rate below Melbourne Renegades.Both innings started in a similar fashion in front of almost 21,000 spectators. Thunder crashed to 12 for three inside the first three overs, with all three dismissed batters trapped lbw.Sean Abbott gave Sydney Sixers early breakthroughs•Getty Images

A fourth wicket stand of 64 between Alex Ross (34 off 34) and Sam Whiteman (42 off 34) in his first BBL game of the season, revived the Thunder innings.The Sixers regained the initiative by taking 3 for 17 but some lusty late innings hitting from Ben Cutting (26 not out from 15 balls) boosted Thunder’s total.Abbott (3-9 off four overs) bowled 17 dot balls and boosted his haul for the season to 16, joint second-highest along with the Scorchers Andrew Tye and the Strikers Henry Thornton.Thunder needed quick wickets and like the Sixers struck three times in the powerplay.Captain and spinner Chris Green (2-29 off four) had Josh Philippe caught at slip in the second over and Cutting took a fine leaping catch at third man off Brendan Doggett (1-23 off four) to remove James Vince.Green then had the recalled Kurtis Patterson caught in the deep.English internationals Hales, Vince and Sixers paceman Chris Jordan were all playing their final game of this season’s BBL.The Sixers will regain Test stars Steve Smith and Nathan Lyon, while Thunder welcome back David Warner.

Somerset spinner in prime position to fill key England vacancy, after overcoming trauma of suspect action

Andrew McGlashan in Auckland21-Mar-2018A bad round of golf didn’t seem so frustrating for Somerset left-arm spinner Jack Leach when his phone rang last week. It was the call that told him to get on a plane to New Zealand after Mason Crane had been diagnosed with a stress fracture of his lower back.”We’d had a couple of days’ golf and I’d just played the worst round of my life,” Leach said. “My golf’s shocking. I don’t even enjoy it, I won’t pretend, and I’d just lost to [director of cricket] Andy Hurry. It was a bad day up until I got the call but it turned into a very good day.”For any player a maiden call-up to the senior side is a wonderful moment, but Leach can be afforded an extra dose of satisfaction. A year ago he was trying to rebuild his confidence having, to the surprise of many, been discovered to have an illegal bowling action. The problem was discovered in September 2016, during routine testing at the ECB academy in Loughborough, and the issue became public when he wasn’t called up to the India squad later that year as an injury replacement for Zafar Ansari.

Trescothick’s forgotten pen-pal

A ten-year-old Jack Leach once received a hand-written letter from the man who now sometimes fields on his knees to him at slip for Somerset.
Marcus Trescothick was Leach’s hero growing up, and was sent a letter by him one Christmas, but could not remember penning the response until Leach showed him a copy years later.
“I reminded Tres of this like last year or something and said ‘do you remember this letter?’ and he said ‘no, no, it was probably my agent writing back to you’. So then I showed him the letter and he was like ‘oh, that’s my writing!’ so he had actually decided on this one he wanted to reply, which is quite a nice story. I share a dressing room with him now so it’s nice to know he was bothered to reply.”

Now he is an injury or tactical decision away from a Test debut, which is just reward for the most prolific spinner in county cricket over the last two seasons with 116 wickets – 51 of them coming in 2017 as he settled into his new action.”It wasn’t until the back end of last season that I started to feel mentally back to normal,” Leach said. “It was more the mental rather than the physical aspect of it, getting used to feeling like I could just bowl normally again. That I’d done the work and didn’t have to control it in my mind because the last thing you want to do in a game is think about your action. You want to be focusing on how you’re going to get them out so it was about doing that repetition in practice so I didn’t have to think about it.”Leach has previously spoken about the fears he had of being labelled a chucker or cheat after the kink in his action was revealed. Over the last year he has worked with an ECB psychologist and believes in the long run the challenge he’s been through will serve him well for a Test career.”It’s about having that resilience isn’t it? The day it came out … that was like a horrible thing for me, I hadn’t had that exposure I guess. Up until then it had been all very positive – you’re doing well in county cricket, no one knows a lot about you apart from your stats are good, so you just get praise. So to experience that before I’d actually played any international cricket or been involved with international cricket was actually quite good for me. I’ve learnt a little bit about that side of it as well.”It made me understand my bowling a lot better, it’s made me a better bowler … having a stronger and smoother action was what was going to help me. It was only a good thing to find that out and something that’s probably pushed me on.”Not only has Leach had to battle the issue over his action, he has also had to fend off suggestions he has had it a bit too easy due to the wickets at Taunton, which always felt a slightly odd argument when England’s incumbent spinners were struggling to have much impact on pitches offering assistance.”I’d be keen on more wickets [like Taunton],” he said. “It is a double-edged sword because you do get that ‘can he only do it on turning wickets?’ I know from when I’ve played away from home that I can do it away from home as well so I have no lack of confidence, I guess, away from Taunton or away from spinning wickets. It’s about being adaptive and learning all those different things. I’d say bowling at Taunton has been a very good thing for me because it’s given me more overs as a spinner which sometimes in England is tough for spinners. It’s definitely progressed my career quicker, I would say. I also now look forward to bowling on flatter pitches to test my skills on those.”Leach has been involved with the Lions over the last five months, firstly in Australia and then West Indies. Down under was a challenging experience for him – he played for an England XI in a two-day game in Western Australia where he picked up four wickets but went at 10 an over during a run chase – however he learnt a lot from watching Nathan Lyon. The Caribbean brought considerable success despite the Lions being well beaten, as he claimed 18 wickets in the three four-day matches.Moeen Ali has manfully carried England’s spin-bowling role over his 49 Tests with some notable success at home, but plenty of toil overseas, with an Ashes bowling average of 115 a particular low point. Crane was given a debut in Sydney but is raw, and now faces time on the sidelines, while Adil Rashid has given up first-class cricket. With tours to Sri Lanka and West Indies next winter, two trips where spin will play a big role, there is a huge opportunity for Leach.”I always believed that this was where I was hopefully going to get to. I definitely did,” he said. “I think those little lower moments definitely made me stronger and definitely helped someone like me. No doubt there will be more. I try to learn not to get too emotional and just learn from every opportunity.”

Mooney, Lanning, Gardner, Brown, Jonassen put in crucial contributions as India fall just short

Firdose Moonda23-Feb-2023Australia have reached a seventh successive T20 World Cup final but not without an almighty fight from India, who came five runs short in a thrilling semi-final in Cape Town. The margin of defeat is four runs smaller than it was at the Commonwealth Games final last year, but that will be little consolation for India, who came agonisingly close while chasing 173.They were clumsy in the field, conceded at least 15 runs through overthrows and misfields and dropped two crucial catches – of Meg Lanning on 1 and Beth Mooney on 32 – and were equally nervy between the wickets. Two crucial run-outs dented their chase including that of Harmanpreet Kaur, which led to India’s slide.The India captain was ill on the eve of the match and briefly hospitalised with a fever but fronted up to lead her side and almost took them home. After a poor start which left India on 28 for 3 in the fourth over, Harmanpreet shared in a 69-run fourth-wicket stand with Jemimah Rodrigues and then brought up her first fifty of the tournament. She had barely celebrated it when her bat got stuck in the ground while sliding it for a second run and Alyssa Healy was quick to break the stumps, leaving India’s middle and lower order to get 40 runs off the last 32 balls.

Shafali Verma fumbles, then flounders, then finally holds on

Shafali Verma was responsible for the first misfield on a messy day for India, when she dived over the top of a Healy drive to allow what should have been a single turn into two in the first over. India let at least two more ones get doubled up on before they got their first wicket when Healy charged against Radha Yadav and was stumped to give them some joy.Radha should have had another in her next over when Mooney lofted a drive to Shafali at long-on. The ball came to her at waist height and should have been easily taken but she let it slip through her hands and bounce over the boundary. Mooney went on to hit three more fours before trying to cut a Shikha Pandey ball that was too close to her body and found Shafali again. She was stationed at point and made no mistake this time for the simple catch. She was clearly relieved and celebrated by banging the ball into the turf. Mooney was dismissed on 54, which meant Shafali’s miss cost India 22 runs.

Ashleigh Gardner’s late attack

After Healy and Mooney’s opening stand of 52, and Mooney and Lanning’s 36-run stand off 27 balls, Ashleigh Gardner arrived to put the finishing touches on an innings that was well set up. She found her first boundary with a clip off Sneh Rana in an over that cost 14 runs and then upped the ante for high-octane entry into the last five overs. Gardner slog swept Radha over midwicket, then lofted her between long-off and cover and then took back-to-back boundaries off Renuka Singh. She had plundered 28 runs off her first 14 balls and put Australia in a position to push for a total above 170. She was bowled by a Deepti Sharma yorker in the 18th over, and Australia still managed 30 runs in the last two overs to reach 172.Ashleigh Gardner’s cameo pushed Australia forward•ICC/Getty Images

Mayhem in the middle

India’s chase started in the worst possible way when Shafali was given out lbw as she missed a flick off Megan Schutt. She was hit above the knee roll and reviewed, with both height and the prospect of the ball missing leg stump on the cards, but was confirmed out on umpire’s call. Five balls later, a Gardner arm ball trapped Smriti Mandhana in her crease as she tried to defend and Australia reviewed on suspicion of pad first. They were right and India had lost their openers.But the worst came in the over after that when Yastika Bhatia, included in the side after last playing in India’s tournament opener, flicked Darcie Brown to Grace Harris at short midwicket and set off for a run even though Rodrigues didn’t move. By the time Bhatia turned to get back, Harris’ throw had already reached Healy, who had the time to run in and break the stumps. India were 28 for 3 in the fourth over.Jemimah Rodrigues and Harmanpreet Kaur took India close•AFP/Getty Images

Rodrigues rides the wave and Harmanpreet falls short

Rodrigues and Harmanpreet were not rattled by the early wickets and took charge of the innings for the next 6.4 overs. Harmanpreet showed few signs of being under the weather and Rodrigues displayed the confidence she showed against Pakistan. Harmanpreet struck India’s first six with a strong swing over long-on and Rodrigues turned it on with two gorgeous lofted off drives off Georgia Wareham. India were 93 for 3 after 10 overs, with the required run rate at eight an over and the pair were going smoothly.Rodrigues started the second half of the innings with another classic drive and then tried to get cute against a Brown short ball. She shaped up to ramp it over Healy’s head but got a thin edge and was caught behind to leave her captain to complete the chase. Harmanpreet got to her fifty off 32 balls and took India to within 40 runs of victory before she was run-out for the first time in nearly five years in T20Is, and India’s lower order couldn’t take them over the line.

Sydney Thunder’s batting struggled again to leave them winless from three matches

AAP and ESPNcricinfo staff18-Oct-2022Hobart Hurricanes posted their second win of the campaign with a 49-run belting of the Sydney Thunder at Blacktown.Opener Lizelle Lee top scored with 41 off 29 balls as the Hurricanes scored 7 for 141 from their 20 overs. It was the highest total in the first group of games at the venue it what has proved a tough batting surface.Tammy Beaumont again fell cheaply at the start of Thunder’s chase. Australian hopeful Phoebe Litchfield made 28 before Molly Strano bowled the opener in the eighth over and that proved their top score.Hayley Jensen, Heather Graham and Maisy Gibson took two wickets apiece, the latter claiming the key scalp of Rachael Haynes, as Thunder were bowled out for 95 in 18.1 overs and they are winless from three games as they head on the road for the first time this season. Things are unlikely to get easier, though, as they meant defending champions Perth Scorchers next on their turf.

Pakistan battled through an absorbing third day, but defeat is only a matter of time

The Report by Andrew Miller05-Jan-2019At the fourth time of asking, Pakistan’s batsmen found the grit, resolve and flair required to compete with a pumped-up South African attack in their own conditions. But, despite a fine century stand between Asad Shafiq and Shan Masood, and a doughty 72 from Babar Azam, their opponents could not be denied forever, as South Africa’s pace quartet closed ranks in the evening session to put a crushing victory beyond doubt.By the close, Pakistan had at least staved off the prospect of an innings defeat, with Babar’s hard-fought half-century providing the lower-order with backbone as Dale Steyn in particular rolled back the years in a venomous short-pitched onslaught on any tailender who strayed into his sights. But, with a target of 41 when play resumes on day four, a swift kill and a 2-0 series win is surely a formality.In fact, the match might yet have been wrapped up this evening, but for some farcical scenes in the closing overs of the day. With a lead of 25, and the prospect of an extra half-hour for South Africa to gallop to the finish, Vernon Philander looked to have finished the innings when Mohammad Abbas slogged to mid-off. But with the players already sprinting from the field – not least Quinton de Kock, who had clearly been primed to give it some humpty as a pinch-hitter – replays showed that Philander had overstepped.Back came South Africa’s fielders – de Kock still pulling his gloves back on with a look of misery on his face – whereupon Shaheen Afridi served up another over of mayhem, mowing 12 vital runs off Steyn, including a top-edged four, a straight six, a dropped catch and a thump on the helmet. By the time his fun was eventually ended to give Kagiso Rabada his fourth wicket of the innings, the moment had passed, and de Kock decided that a 20-minute timeframe in which to slap his side to victory was too tight an ask, and the umpires said that was that.The scenes in those closing overs epitomised an engrossing day’s play, and one in which Pakistan actually made much of the running. This came principally through Shafiq and Masood’s enterprising third-wicket stand of 132 – their team’s first three-figure partnership of the series – and so well did they play that, for as long as it lasted, a Headingley or Kolkata-style miracle could not be entirely ruled out. This is Pakistan after all, the team that is never more dangerous than when they have been completely written off.And that was pretty much the situation when Shafiq and Masood came together at 27 for 2 in the 11th over of Pakistan’s second innings, following the dismissal of Azhar Ali to a shooter from Rabada that pinned him plumb on the front pad for 6. In the first hour of the morning, South Africa’s tail had biffed a quick 49 runs to take their lead to a daunting 254, and that surely seemed enough to see off a side that had not passed 200 in any of its previous three innings of the series.But Masood and Shafiq had other ideas. Masood had been promoted to open in place of the misfiring Fakhar Zaman after making an attractive 44 in the first innings, and responded with another unruffled performance that was at odds with the skittish efforts around him. But it was Shafiq’s injection of intent after the lunch break that turned Pakistan’s innings from one of dour survival to something approaching a genuine counterattack.Shafiq had to ride his luck early on, with both Philander and Duanne Olivier finding awkward lift from a good length to threaten his gloves and ribs. But, having laced a brace of enterprising cuts for four through backward point, his innings went into overdrive after taking on an Olivier bouncer, and top-edging a six over fine leg.Suddenly, all short balls were being treated as an opportunity for runs, and with South Africa maintaining their attacking fields with a big deficit still to be written off, there were plenty of gaps to be exploited. At the close of the second day, Mickey Arthur had made some damning comments about the state of the pitches for this series, but Shafiq’s shift in mindset seemed more than enough to transcend the apparent demons, as he rattled through to a 56-ball half-century.At the other end, Masood grew in stature as the partnership progressed. He had the closest shave of the innings when, on 24, he successfully overturned an lbw decision that was shown to be missing leg, but aside from his defensive purity, it was the quality of his strokeplay that stood out, in particular a laced drive through long-off that was little more than a push.His fifty came up from 98 balls with a flick for four off the pads against Steyn, and he had just passed 100 runs for the match when Steyn extracted his revenge, finding a perfect length outside off to draw a fatal nibble.Enter Babar, who lived dangerously in the opening moments of his innings, edging low through the slips to get off the mark before wearing a nasty lifter from Rabada on the body two balls later. But he drilled the final two balls of the session for four to sign off in style, and send a signal to South Africa that there’d be plenty more hard yakka to come in the evening session.And so it proved, although perhaps not in the manner anticipated. Shafiq continued to take on the short ball with aplomb to move to within touching distance of a richly deserved century, when the persevering Philander induced a decisive nick in the channel outside off, to send him on his way for 88 and leave Pakistan’s innings in the balance once again at 194 for 4.Fakhar, making his belated appearance at No. 6, was in no mood to restore that balance. His grim tour continued when he made an utter hash of a cross-batted mow at Rabada, who ran back in his follow through to complete a steepling catch, and when the skipper Sarfraz Ahmed was done in by Olivier – his lbw adjudged to be clipping the bails by roughly the same margin that Temba Bavuma’s had been missing in the first innings – Pakistan were 220 for 6 and freefalling.South Africa saw their opening, and went for it, with Mohammad Amir subjected to a fearful peppering – first from Olivier, who slammed him on the gloves two balls in a row, and then Steyn, who ripped a bouncer through his defences for de Kock to wrap up a savage five-ball duck. The same approach soon did for Yasir Shah too, the substitute Zubayr Hamza making a tough chance look easy at an old-school long-stop position on the boundary, but not before Babar had taken the attack back to his opponents, motoring to his half-century with four fours in an over off Olivier.He did not hold back after that, either. Another top-edge for four took Pakistan into the lead, and he managed four more boundaries – all full-blooded, not all middled – before chancing his arm once too often to give Rabada another breakthrough. From then on it was merely a race against time for South Africa to earn themselves an extra day on the golf course. Afridi’s defiance ensured one last moral victory for Pakistan but a series defeat was all but sealed.

Azhar Mahmood, bowling coach, warns that fast bowler’s workload must be managed across all three formats of the game

Melinda Farrell at Malahide13-May-20180:52

Mahmood calls on Pakistan to manage Amir’s workload

Mohammad Amir was forced from the field with a “chronic” right* knee injury late on the third day at Malahide, a development that will be the cause of some anxiety within the Pakistan camp not only as they look forward to the end of this Test but two more against England.Amir first went off the field after a three-over opening burst, with what appeared to be a slight limp. He came back out soon after, however, and though he was walking gingerly, he eventually came on to bowl again. Two balls in, however, he got into a discussion with captain Sarfraz Ahmed and though it looked as if Amir was suggesting that he finish his over, he eventually walked off. Medical staff will assess the injury after treatment overnight before deciding if he is fit to take part in the rest of the match, though initial assessments suggest it isn’t serious and that he could bowl tomorrow.”He has got a chronic knee problem which has slightly flared up,” said Azhar Mahmood, Pakistan’s bowling coach. “Hopefully, he will be okay tomorrow to bowl for us. He’s having treatment and hopefully tonight we will do a bit more treatment, tomorrow morning, ice as well, so he will be fine.”According to Mahmood, it has been a recurring problem for the fast bowler and it will do little to alleviate concerns about Amir’s long-term future in five-day cricket. Amir has spoken of wanting to manage his workload in the future with the help of a rotation policy that allows him to sit out occasional Tests.That concern comes from having bowled more international overs than any other Pakistan fast bowler since Amir’s return to international cricket in January 2016, a return after five years out. And though it has been over six months since Pakistan’s last Test and Amir has played plenty of cricket in between, this is now twice in two Tests he has gone off with an injury – against Sri Lanka in Dubai it was a problem in his right shin that forced him off.”Yes, you can say that because unfortunately he came back after five years and since he came back he played every format for us,” Azhar said. “We have to manage his workload as well so maybe that’s a sign for us to in the future to see where he stands and we’ve got a bunch of young guys coming up and we want to have Test bowlers separately to the one-day and T20s, so we are working on that and hopefully we can come up with something.”Mahmood emphasised that keeping Amir in Test cricket is Pakistan’s greatest priority.”We want him to play Test cricket because he is our No.1 bowler and we want him to run in and bowl for us. Workload – I have seen a lot of fast bowlers and their body can’t take it, so they just manage to play one format or two formats, but for him it’s a concern for us but hopefully we will manage his workload in the future.”Frustratingly for Amir and Pakistan, the injury occurred just as he was bowling probably his best spell of the tour so far. He got more swing as Ireland followed on than he did in the first innings, though his luck had not returned – two more catches were spilled off his bowling in that burst, bringing to 16 the number of missed chances off Amir’s bowling in his last 17 Tests.*3.15pm, May 14: this story was amended when the PCB clarified that the problem was with Amir’s right knee having originally said left