<\/p>\n
Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyon put Australia in the driving seat of the second Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Wednesday to leave Pakistan tottering at 194-6, still 124 runs behind on day two.<\/p>\n
At stumps, Mohammad Rizwan was on 29 and Aamer Jamal not out two after Cummins took the crucial wickets of Abdullah Shafique (62) and Babar Azam (one), then Agha Salman (five).<\/p>\n
Lyon chipped in by removing Imamul Haq (10) and Shan Masood (54), while Josh Hazlewood bowled Saud Shakeel for nine as Pakistan\u2019s dream of a first Test win in Australia since 1995 faded.<\/p>\n
The visitors had claimed seven wickets in the morning session on a pitch offering seam and swing, restricting the hosts to 318.<\/p>\n
Aamer Jamal spearheaded Pakistan\u2019s charge with 3-64 after Australia resumed on 187-3 after being sent into bat, with Marnus Labuschagne top-scoring on 63.<\/p>\n
Openers Haq and Shafique made a positive start in reply, surviving a series of loud appeals.<\/p>\n
But veteran spinner Lyon, fresh from taking his 500th wicket during the first Test in Perth, finally earned a reward when Haq edged to Labuschagne at slip.<\/p>\n
Undeterred, Pakistan upped the run rate after tea with Masood hitting Lyon for six and Shafique reaching his first Test 50 in Australia, and fifth overall, with a four off Mitchell Starc.<\/p>\n
But their 90-run partnership was broken by Cummins, who showed sharp reflexes to stick out his left hand for a catch off his own bowling to end Shafique\u2019s stay.<\/p>\n
Fired up, he then clean bowled danger man Azam before Lyon returned to claim his second wicket when Masood miscued and Mitchell Marsh did well to hold a catch with the sun in his eyes.<\/p>\n
Hazlewood took care of Shakeel before Cummins brought himself back and accounted for Salman, caught by wicketkeeper Alex Carey to leave Pakistan in trouble.<\/p>\n
Labuschagne had been a rock on day one, digging in for an overnight 44 off 120 balls.<\/p>\n
He padded up again alongside Travis Head on nine with the sun shining, smacking a boundary off Shaheen Shah Afridi in the opening over to signal Australia\u2019s intent.<\/p>\n
The explosive Head drove Hasan Ali to the ropes off his first ball and followed it up with another in the same over to quickly get in the groove.<\/p>\n
But his flair cost him on 17, lashing at a wide Afridi delivery that took a thick edge and was well collected by Salman in the slips.<\/p>\n
At the other end, Labuschagne kept plugging away to bring up his 17th Test half-century.<\/p>\n
Marsh was given out twice in successive balls during a fiery Ali over while on seven by West Indian umpire Joel Wilson. He reviewed both decisions \u2014 for lbw and caught behind \u2014 and survived.<\/p>\n
But just as the match appeared to be slipping away from Pakistan, Jamal bagged the wicket of Labuschagne, who edged to Shafique at slip.<\/p>\n
Carey and Starc quickly followed as Pakistan cashed in with a new ball, before Marsh holed out to Jamal off Mir Hamza on 41 and the tail folded.<\/p>\n
Australia won the first Test of the three-match series in Perth by 360 runs.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyon put Australia in the driving seat of the second Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Wednesday to leave Pakistan tottering at 194-6, still 124 runs behind on day two. At stumps, Mohammad Rizwan was on 29 and Aamer Jamal not out two after Cummins took the crucial wickets of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40455,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.dawn.com\/large\/2023\/12\/271258498e7c50b.jpg?r=131508","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[192],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-islamabad-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}