THE cricket never ends and the carnival must keep performing, whether anyone is watching or not. That is what I say when friends ask me why, when a one-day series at home against Australia has just finished, England are now playing a three-Test series against Pakistan, in Pakistan. There is money to be made, contracts to be honoured, television deals to be kept. The show must go on.
And so the show arrives in Multan on Monday, where England will look to build on a successful home summer, in which they won five out of the six matches they played. Indeed, the last time they visited Pakistan in 2022, they won 3-0 and were the first team to score 500 runs in a single day of Test cricket. It was Bazball at its Bazballiest, as England battered their way past flat pitches and indifferent bowling to record a thumping win away from home, something that had eluded them for some time.
England's squad, much like its style, has been refined since then and they head into this series as overwhelming favourites against a Pakistan side that have been struggling of late, most notoriously in their World Cup loss to the US, and most recently in a 2-0 walloping they received at home at the hands of Bangladesh.
This story is from the October 02,2024 edition of Country Life UK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the October 02,2024 edition of Country Life UK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Tales as old as time
By appointing writers-in-residence to landscape locations, the National Trust is hoping to spark in us a new engagement with our ancient surroundings, finds Richard Smyth
Do the active farmer test
Farming is a profession, not a lifestyle choice’ and, therefore, the Budget is unfair
Night Thoughts by Howard Hodgkin
Charlotte Mullins comments on Moght Thoughts
SOS: save our wild salmon
Jane Wheatley examines the dire situation facing the king of fish
Into the deep
Beneath the crystal-clear, alien world of water lie the great piscean survivors of the Ice Age. The Lake District is a fish-spotter's paradise, reports John Lewis-Stempel
It's alive!
Living, burping and bubbling fermented masses of flour, yeast and water that spawn countless loaves—Emma Hughes charts the rise and rise) of sourdough starters
There's orange gold in them thar fields
A kitchen staple that is easily taken for granted, the carrot is actually an incredibly tricky customer to cultivate that could reduce a grown man to tears, says Sarah Todd
True blues
I HAVE been planting English bluebells. They grow in their millions in the beechwoods that surround us—but not in our own garden. They are, however, a protected species. The law is clear and uncompromising: ‘It is illegal to dig up bluebells or their bulbs from the wild, or to trade or sell wild bluebell bulbs and seeds.’ I have, therefore, had to buy them from a respectable bulb-merchant.
Oh so hip
Stay the hand that itches to deadhead spent roses and you can enjoy their glittering fruits instead, writes John Hoyland
A best kept secret
Oft-forgotten Rutland, England's smallest county, is a 'Notswold' haven deserving of more attention, finds Nicola Venning
