Shan Masood was gushing in his praise of South Africa’s quicks, but extreme pace is currently off the cards for his side
Danyal Rasool06-Jan-2025If someone told you Pakistan had lost 20 successive Test matches in South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, you’d be forgiven for thinking they were talking about rugby. But after Pakistan slipped to another Test defeat in the watery evening sunshine of Cape Town, they ensured that ignominious statistic had reached a nice round number.There isn’t a single explanation for a run that stretches back to 2013, but it is possible to be more specific when it comes to this particular Test at Newlands, and Shan Masood certainly was. He paid rich tribute to South Africa’s pace bowlers, acknowledging he was impressed they kept their speeds up, despite bowling 176.3 consecutive overs to dismiss Pakistan twice. Pakistan, meanwhile, had no bowler that truly came close to the pace of Kagiso Rabada, Marco Jansen, and Kwena Maphaka.”SA bowled really well in both innings,” Masood said. “Their pace was up. That has been a key difference in this series. If you look at our first innings, 132-135 [kph] not carrying to the slips compared to 138-144 when Maphaka was bowling. Those are the balls that beat the batter or hit you on the pads. That is a difference and it is something we want to do in Test cricket as well.”Related
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Six years ago in Cape Town, another Pakistan captain sat in the Newlands press box, and was coruscating about his bowlers’ lack of pace. South Africa had just knocked off a routine fourth innings run chase, and Sarfaraz Ahmed compared his own bowlers unfavourably to South Africa’s.”If you talk about our bowling and their bowling, I think there’s a big difference in the two,” Sarfaraz had said. “The way our bowlers are bowling is not up to the mark in this Test match. If you see our bowlers, they’re bowling 128-129, and the average speed is 130, while their bowlers are bowling at 145. If you are going to bowl with that lack of pace here you won’t get wickets.”I don’t know what’s going on there. Previously it happened, too, when I came here in 2013, the same problem occurred. At the time we had [Mohammad] Irfan, Umar Gul and Tanvir Ahmed. Their pace was down too. I don’t know what’s happening here in Cape Town.”But while those comments may have been intended as a public rebuke to Mohammad Amir and Shaheen Afridi, the variance in pace didn’t come as a surprise to Masood. Pakistan opted against playing their only express seamer – Naseem Shah – in Cape Town under circumstances that are, at best, murky, vaguely citing a back issue and chest congestion. It left Pakistan with a bowling attack of four men who could only really be described as medium fast: Khurram Shahzad, Mohammad Abbas, Mir Hamza and Aamer Jamal’s average pace was between 125kph and 132kph, with not a single ball bowled over 140kph.On the second day during the tea break, however, Naseem was on a practice pitch a few strips across from the playing surface, bowling at full pelt – significantly quicker than any of the starting squad, unencumbered by the sorts of fitness issues that ostensibly kept him out. Similarly, Afridi, the other bowler with Test pedigree who could have brought higher pace, was given leave to play the Bangladesh Premier League, despite the PCB insisting national duty took first priority.It remains unclear whether he was dropped or made himself unavailable, but the result remains the same: South Africa had bowlers who ensured their pace remained high, while Pakistan fielded a quartet who physically could not.”The clear difference was the fast bowling where they bowled a lot of overs at decent pace,” Masood said. “We have to look at a lot of other things in our set-up. How to keep the quicks fresh, how to get an extra batter in the squad. Like Aamer Jamal, if we can find another bowler who’s a good bowler and batter. Like South Africa have Marco Jansen. He’s good with the bat and very good with the ball. If we can find a few cricketers like that, it’d be good for our Test make-up as well where we can play that extra spinner.”They were pretty decent with reverse swing, too. Even today, when Maphaka came on before the second new ball, his pace was up. Jansen’s a superb cricketer, Rabada’s one of the greatest bowlers to play the game. On the fast bowling front, in the first Test, they had [Dane] Paterson: a wily customer, clever, skilled and experienced. I thought their fast-bowling department was really good.”It is an unusual position for Pakistan to find themselves in. Having waxed lyrical about the strength and depth of its their pace attack over the years, Pakistan must now contend with the suddenly denuded nature of their Test pace cabinet. While just two months ago, they fielded an electric high pace attack comprising Afridi, Naseem, Mohammad Hasnain and Haris Rauf, they find themselves in a situation where their desire to play Test cricket hovers between varying degrees of reluctance. Rauf pushed that recalcitrance to the extreme when he refused to tour Australia for a three-Test series last year, and briefly lost his central contract, while Hasnain has not played first-class cricket since a county stint in 2022.It makes it tricky to work out what a lost series in South Africa means. Pakistan appear to have shifted away from using pace at home, famously defeating England 2-1 in October with a spin-heavy strategy. When West Indies visit later this month for two Tests, a similar strategy will be followed, with high-pace likely non-existent. It may mean Pakistan have reconciled themselves to opting out of matching countries like South Africa for pace when they show up here, or in Australia.This tour of South Africa could end up being a harbinger of that. It remains to be seen whether such a deal – which with their history and culture may be viewed as almost Faustian – is one their supporters will simply have to resign themselves to.