Cricket: Pakistani youngster stamps his mark

You couldn't get much that is more precisely half-formed than this Pakistan team that so recently beat the Australians and now awaits something close to evisceration by England. Except, maybe, for Mohammad Aamer.

England are also not close to perfection as they acknowledge their debt to the batting of test newcomer Eoin Morgan and the revived swing bowling of Jimmy Anderson. Without these, England would be reeling at the prospect of Ashes action in a few months.

Wasim Akram saw something of himself when he first saw Aamer as a 15-year-old of outrageous confidence and talent. Akram can congratulate himself for alerting a cricket board not always noted for its visionary flair.

In the flood of English dominance released by Morgan's bold hitting and Anderson's eager seizing of optimum bowling conditions, the 18-year-old Aamer has looked separate from all around him in the most brilliant way. He looks like a supreme sportsman, eager and lithe, and his temperament seems perfectly pitched for the challenge of a long journey.

As it was with the young Sobers and Tendulkar and Lara, so it is with Aamer. You have to remind yourself how young he is - then speculate on how far his talent will stretch.

If Pakistan should make the follow-on target of 155, a prospect made feasible by the late hitting of fellow seam bowler Umar Gul and his own watchful aggression after the batsmen had crumbled before Anderson and Steve Finn to a miserable 47 for 6, Aamer could yet play a vital role in a match that England threatened to overrun.

Aamer's burgeoning legend began with his most dramatic day's work in test cricket - in Melbourne when, while still 17, he gained the three key Australian scalps of Ricky Ponting, Michael Clarke and Michael Hussey. Here, though the impression has been spread over two days of extraordinary authority, one characteristic has become increasingly apparent.

It is extreme patience in the face of the worst of luck. He bowled beautifully while sending back Andrew Strauss, Alistair Cook and Jonathan Trott. He also knew that, with a little luck and competence by his team-mates in the slips and behind the wicket, he would surely have claimed the five-wicket haul that eventually fell to Mohammad Asif.

Frustration might have spilt over in a lesser man when possibly the most serious crime of all was committed - by Imran Farhat in the slips. He dropped Morgan after one of the most comfortable of edges and the reaction of the victim could easily have been volcanic. Instead, Aamer almost languidly kicked the air. It was the gesture of someone who suspected there might be more opportunities.

That idea was only enhanced when Aamer returned to the action with a bat in his hand. Periodically he leant on it as though he didn't have a care and when he struck four boundaries, they came with perfect timing. He was careful, defiant for most of his watch, which brought 25 runs in 87 minutes. When it was over there was the sense Pakistan had lost their best chance of deliverance.

England probably are too ready to have faith in their own powers. Their batting was quite feeble when the contributions of Morgan and Paul Collingwood were removed. Anderson, a lion yesterday, tends to be less influential when conditions are less favourable.

Pakistan, with a few notable exceptions, seemed to have little heart for the battle. Aamer refused to be cowed and if there is one certainty it is that, at 18, the future, if not this particular test series, belongs to him.

England: 354
Pakistan: 147-9

- The Independent