Duckett top-scored for England before becoming the second of the debutant leg-spinner's seven victims on a pulsating day in Multan
Ben Duckett declared England to be "pretty happy overall" with their work on the first day of the second Test at Multan, where Pakistan finished 174 runs behind the tourists after another action-packed afternoon.
Duckett top-scored for England, making 63 in 49 balls before becoming the second of Abrar Ahmed's seven victims on a remarkable Test debut for the spinner. He was trapped in front as he looked to sweep and was given out on review.
It was an extraordinary first day in international cricket for Abrar, who had been left out at Rawalpindi but caused England all kinds of problems with his unorthodox wrist-spin.
"He was basically a leg-spinner who had a good googly," said Duckett, speaking to Sky Sports at the close of play. "There was no real mystery to it, but he bowled beautifully today."
Abrar used his googly to bowl Zak Crawley and Ben Stokes, while accounting for Ollie Pope, Joe Root and Will Jacks with his leg-break. Root and Stokes in particular fell to superb deliveries. At one stage, he had dismissed England's entire top seven and had taken every wicket to fall, with his eyes on all ten.
Abrar Ahmed bowled Ben Stokes with the ball of the day (Matthew Lewis/Getty Images)
The 24-year-old described the Stokes wicket – a googly that pitched on leg-stump and then slid past his outside edge to take the off-bail – as his favourite, adding that Stokes is "my favourite player".
"I cannot forget the day," he said through an interpreter. "I want to win this match for Pakistan. Not only this match, but I want to do well in the coming matches for Pakistan as well.
"I definitely thought about taking five wickets on debut but not so quickly."
He finished with figures of 7 for 114 from 22 overs, a collection of numbers in tune with England's new style in Test cricket.
A final total of 281 in 51.4 overs reflected that, with Stokes and Brendon McCullum "very happy, they're so positive", according to Duckett.
"The way we scored, a lot of teams might have been quite tentative and could easily have been 100 for 5 or 6 at lunch," he said.
Duckett relied on his sweep shot for the majority of his 63 runs (Matthew Lewis/Getty Images)
"We kind of prepared for this pitch. We knew they wanted it to spin; we just didn't know how early it would happen. I said to myself I was going to sweep both ways and I'd much rather get out playing that shot than a forward defence."
On the threat posed by Abrar, he added: "His googly was a lot slower and in general most of the guys said they did pick him. He just bowled some nice deliveries, and unfortunately for us it was his day today.
"I'm sure we'll have our plans in the second innings, but I'm pretty sure they won't be blocking him."
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