Twitter Reactions: Pakistan on top despite Kane Williamson and Watling's resistance

The deciding Test match of the enthralling Test series between Pakistan and New Zealand got underway today in Abu Dhabi. The visitors won the toss and without any doubt in mind, opted to bat first as they made two changes to their line-up. While William Somerville was handed over a debut in place of Ish Sodhi, the experienced Tim Southee replaced Neil Wagner. Shaheen Afridi, in the other camp, wore the white jersey for his country for the first time as Mohammad Abbas was injured and ruled out.

In the sub-continent, winning the toss is the most important thing and the Kiwis did it. It was all up to their batsmen now to put up a decent total on the board in order to put pressure on the opposition. Their openers, Jeet Raval and Tom Latham, didn’t disappoint and got off to a flyer with boundaries coming regularly. But the debutant kept his cool and consistently swung the ball into the batsmen.

Latham fell into the trap as the on-field decision was superbly overturned with a smart use of DRS to give the youngster his first wicket in the format. Kane Williamson‘s arrival, as usual, brought calmness to the proceedings and it rubbed the shoulders of Raval as well.

Both of them looked authoritative in their shots and added 46 runs for the second wicket. But once again when Raval looked comfortable in the middle, he was snaffled by his nemesis Yasir Shah. This was the beginning of a mini-collapse once again. Ross Taylor was castled off the very first ball as the ball kept alarmingly low and Henry Nicholls was bowled around his playing a sweep shot.

Impeccable resistance from Kane and BJ

In no time, Pakistan had reduced the tourists from 70/1 to 72/4 and a collapse like the last game was a possibility yet again. But Williamson and BJ Watling showed impeccable resistance to not give away their wickets. Sarfraz Ahmed made frequent changes to the bowling attack but they stayed put to their defense. While the Kiwi skipper accumulated runs whenever available, Watling was just all about defending and a single here or there.

Courtesy them, New Zealand didn’t lose any wicket in the second and things came back to normalcy for them. The aim was now to post a significant total on the board. These were danger signs for the home side as Williamson looked set for his century and Watling was playing with his usual pace.

Hasan Ali breaks through

The partnership crossed the three-figure mark and was threatening to blossom even more. In the meantime, Williamson sensationally fell in the trap thanks to the reverse swing generated by Hasan Ali. He made the Kiwi captain flick the ball in the air and it went straight into the short mid-wicket fielder Asad Shafiq’s throat who didn’t miss. This was yet another period where Pakistan dominated by picking quick wickets.

Colin de Grandhomme threw his wicket away once again after scoring a quick-fire 20 while Southee was snaffled soon by Bilal Asif. At 209/7, Pakistan threatened to run away with the game, but Kiwis being the fighters, didn’t give up. The debutant Somerville resisted and Watling was still there at the other end doing his job perfectly.

They made sure that New Zealand didn’t botch up the advantage completely after winning the toss and ended the day on 229/7. The second day will be huge for both the teams as far as the series is concerned and if New Zealand somehow manage to cross 300, we could have a game on in Abu Dhabi with their bowling capable of picking 20 wickets.

Here’s how Twitter reacted during the course of the day’s play:

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