Batting is all about solving problems, and the grand old man of Essex backs the England captain to find a way past this one – just like he did
Joe Root lets out a “Woaaa-ho!” as a ball from Pakistan’s Mohammad Ali angles in and then jags away late at Lord’s on the evening of day two. The ball flies past Root’s batting gloves and thuds into Mohammed Rizwan’s keeping ones at head height behind the stumps. Rizwan is stood back too, not up to the stumps and breathing down Root’s neck in the summer 2026 way of things.
Root offers that impish smile and shakes his head at the deviousness of the delivery. He isn’t smiling after the next ball. Ali pushes his follow-up fuller, it doesn’t zip and lift away but darts back and scuds low, pinning Root on the pad. He reviews with a weary shrug but he knows his fate – it’s his second lbw dismissal in the Test, his seventh of the summer and ninth in his past 12 innings.
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