England will need all the resilience they can muster in Rawalpindi this week as they head into a series decider against Pakistan which the hosts are doing their utmost to ensure will be played on another sharply-turning pitch.
Patio heaters, windbreaks and industrial-sized fans are being employed to dry out the surface as Pakistan try and replicate the used pitch their spinners had so much joy on during their series-levelling win in Multan last week.
That may not be good news for England, who have now lost their past five Tests on spinning pitches if we include the final four matches in India earlier this year.
However, in Jack Leach they not only have a player who embodies the resilience within this group but a spinner who is likely to get the most joy out of a turning pitch from an English perspective.
“If it’s the same again, then great,” says a relaxed Leach sitting in the gardens of England’s hotel in Islamabad. “I’ve tried to not expect too much from looking at a wicket – you never know what’s going to happen.”
Leach is an odd case study. Now aged 33, he lost his England place last summer to Somerset team-mate Shoaib Bashir having missed the final four Tests in India with a knee injury he sustained in the field during the first at Hyderabad.
But he has been the most effective slow bowler in this series so far, with 14 wickets at 26.50 in comparison to Bashir’s six at 51.16.
Of course Bashir, who turned 21 last week, usurped Leach because England view his raw attributes – mainly his height – and potential as something worth investing in.
That potential was evident in India, where he picked up 17 wickets, and again last summer when his rapid five-wicket haul at Trent Bridge hurried the West Indies to defeat in the second Test.
It’s telling then that in the hours after that victory, Ben Stokes phoned Leach to reassure him he was still part of England’s plans. The pair go back a long way and shared one of the biggest moments in English cricket’s recent history against Australia at Headingley in 2019 when their dramatic final-wicket stand of 76 – Leach’s contribution being one – sealed a memorable Ashes win.
“He phoned me on the evening from the hotel after that win,” revealed Leach of that aftermath of Trent Bridge.
“He just wanted to tell me how great I was basically, in the way that he does, and just recognise how I’ve dealt with the situation. That gave me a chance to say some nice things back to him about what he’d given me probably going back to 2019 at Headingly. He gave me that moment.
“There’s a mutual respect there. So it was a nice conversation to have. It just reminded me I was going about things in the right way and gave me confidence I still had something to offer the team and I was a part of it in a small way. That gave me good motivation for the remainder of the summer.”
Leach had a fine season for Somerset, taking 45 wickets at 22.72. But that call in the hours after victory in Nottingham tells us so much about the emotional intelligence of Stokes the captain and the spirit within this Bazball group.
“Yeah, definitely,” says Leach. “I was really happy with that and in a way not surprised because of what I’d experienced when I was there. So I’m just very thankful for that and my relationship with those guys.”
Leach, who lives with the inflammatory bowel disease Crohn’s, is perhaps one of the unluckiest professional athletes around.
That knee injury in Hyderabad was the latest in a long line of setbacks he has had to deal with, including the stress fracture of the back that ruled him out of the 2023 Ashes and the sepsis that made him fear for his life on the 2019 tour of New Zealand.
Yet he has fond memories of Rawalpindi, a venue where he sealed England’s miraculous win on the flattest of pitches two years ago late on the final day when he trapped Naseem Shah lbw.
“That’s probably my favourite wicket,” he says. “Just the pictures of the appeal and then just after of everyone celebrating. I remember coming off and saying to Jimmy [Anderson], I feel quite emotional. He was exactly the same.”
As for whether more heroics at Rawalpindi this week might catapult him back to being England’s No 1 spinner, Leach is philosophical.
“I don’t know whether that’ll ever happen and for me that’s not the most important thing,” he says.
“Whether you’re playing as that first or second spinner, it doesn’t matter. For me, it’s all about the team. Maybe I’m at an age where that’s all that really matters to me.”
