Pakistan men’s Test captain Shan Masood said the challenge was to perform consistently after the Green Shirts’win against South Africa on Wednesday in the first Test.
Left-arm spinner Noman Ali was South Africa’s chief tormentor as Pakistan won a gripping first Test by 93 runs at Lahore’s Gaddafi Stadium.
Set a daunting 277-run target for victory, the visitors and World Test champions were bowled out for 183 on day four.
Speaking at the post-match press conference, skipper Shan said: “The message is this — we are playing good cricket against quality oppostions.
“But at the same time, the challenge is that we need to consistently perform and win matches against top teams.”
He added that talk regarding the first and second divisions of teams in Test cricket would become moot as a result.
Shan also said that mistakes were made, and although there was room to work around them in home conditions, there might not be similar chances in away conditions.
South African left-armer Senuran Muthusamy took 11-174 in the match.
Pakistan made 378 in their first innings, with South Africa scoring 269 in reply.
On a deteriorating surface, the hosts collapsed in their second innings to 167, but it proved enough.
Player-of-the-match Noman finished with 4-79 and 10-191 in the match for his third haul of ten wickets or more in Tests with his left-arm spin.
As Noman continued to play the main character, bamboozling South African batters on an abrasive pitch in the first Test, Shaheen Shah Afridi keenly waited for his turn.
It finally arrived on the fourth day of the contest after Pakistan’s pace spearhead had bowled in the earlier stages of the match, but for no real avail.
However, on the match’s penultimate morning, when the left-armer’s length delivery darted into South African top-order batter Tony de Dorzi’s pads to trap the southpaw lbw, it was evident that Shaheen was keen to take the centre stage.
The lanky pacer went on to take three more wickets to blow away the South African tail and finished with figures of 4-33.
Shan was all praise for the left-arm pacer, saying: “He showed why he is counted amongst the top bowlers of the world today with his performance.”
The victory gives Pakistan an ideal start to the World Test Championship, having come last in the previous edition.
The second and final Test starts in Rawalpindi from Monday.
“The spinners came into play, reverse swing helped the bowlers do their job today, and the batters did well enough, but we still have a lot of challenges in the middle order,” said Shan.
“We lost 11-37 over the course of two innings, which is not good; we must overcome that.”
‘First innings deficit was crucial’: South Africa skipper
The defeat broke South Africa’s sequence of ten straight Test wins, culminating in the WTC title in June this year when they beat Australia at Lord’s.
Skipper Aiden Markram said the first-innings deficit of 109 was crucial.
“They (Pakistan) had a really good partnership in the first innings when we had them five wickets down,” he said Markram of a Mohammad Rizwan-Salman Agha stand of 163 runs for the sixth wicket.
“We probably could have scored a few more runs in the first innings but I am proud of the way we fought.
“But we need to clean up our game and come back better in the next match.”
He added that the toss was not that crucial to the final result.
Brevis took the fight to the Pakistan spinners in the morning and had reached an aggressive career-best 54, with six fours and two sixes, when Noman bowled him with a sharply turning delivery.
Pakistan had struck in the first over of the day through fast bowler Shaheen, who trapped Tony de Zorzi for 16 without any addition to the overnight total of 51-2.
Tristan Stubbs struggled to cope with the sharp turn and was on two when a premeditated reverse sweep off Noman safely landed in Salman Agha’s hands.
Brevis reached his second Test half-century with a six off Noman before becoming the spinner’s fourth victim.
Opener Rickleton’s dogged resistance was broken by Sajid just before lunch for a gritty 45.
Additional input from AFP
