Latham 113, Conway 92 lead strong New Zealand response

By Chris On Dec 28, 2022

Lunch New Zealand 245 for 2 (Williamson 19*, Nicholls 10*, Nauman 1-73) trail Pakistan 438 (Babar 161, Salman 103, Southee 3-69) by 193 runs

Tom Latham’s 13th Test century, a contentious dismissal for Devon Conway on 92, Sarfaraz Ahmed’s return as captain – albeit as a stand-in – and uneven bounce off the deck were the highlights of the opening session on day three of the Karachi Test.

All that meant New Zealand, adding 80 runs for the loss of two wickets in the morning session, went into lunch at 245 for 2, still 193 runs behind Pakistan’s 438.

New Zealand restarted on 165 for 0, but Conway fell in the day’s sixth over trying to play Nauman Ali off the back foot. Although umpire Aleem Dar deemed an lbw shout not out, Sarfaraz took the review, and even though UltraEdge suggested a small murmur while the ball passed the bat, TV umpire Ahsan Raza concluded there was no bat involved and ball-tracking showed the ball hitting top of leg stump.

Conway’s dismissal, eight short of a fourth Test ton, brought Kane Williamson at No. 3, who batted through the rest of the session to stay unbeaten on 19.

Williamson’s partner for most of the session was the other opener, Latham, who used the sweep to great effect to move to his century in the 60th over. He had started the day on 78 and over the course of the session became the first New Zealand batter to hit 13 Test centuries as opener, going past John Wright’s tally of 12. With the ball staying low on occasions, and both Nauman and Abrar Ahmed finding turn, Latham and Williamson mostly offered defensive shots while putting away deliveries that strayed too far down leg.

Eventually, it was the reverse sweep that ended Latham’s innings, roughly 15 minutes before lunch. Abrar, who had been mixing his legbreaks with the wrong’un through the morning, pitched it up in the 70th over, and the ball hit Latham’s gloves before looping behind him for the substitute fielder Kamran Ghulam at slip to take the catch. Henry Nicholls, at No. 4, was the next batter in, and stayed unbeaten on 10 in Williamson’s company.

That there was a substitute fielder on the field was because a few members of the Pakistan contingent were suffering from a “viral flu” in the morning. Pakistan’s first-innings centurions Babar Azam and Agha Salman did not take the field in the morning, while Shan Masood was briefly away too. That meant Pakistan fielded three substitute fielders at the start of the day’s play, including vice-captain Mohammad Rizwan who was not selected for the first Test.

Rizwan was initially spotted making field changes too. The laws, though, do not allow a substitute fielder to be captain, which meant the Pakistan management soon after named Sarfaraz the on-field captain, and it was Sarfaraz only who took the review that resulted in Conway’s dismissal. In a way, life came full circle for Sarfaraz in the session, since he was the Pakistan captain when he last played a Test in January 2019.

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