Twitter Reactions: Kraigg Brathwaite carries his bat as West Indies take first innings lead

He walked out to bat on the morning of the third day unbeaten on 95 and was just five short of a well deserved Test century. Kraigg Brathwaite raced closer with a boundary on the first ball of the day off a Mohammad Amir delivery. And on the penultimate delivery of the same over he collected a couple to complete hundred runs in the innings. But he wasn’t done yet and kept going rather strongly after the triple figures.

To start with, he had skipper Jason Holder as partner. Holder also played a few shots but paid for shoulder arming an Amir delivery that was angled into the stumps. Brathwaite now had the tail for company but he was determined to make it count. He stayed calm, continued his patient approach, picked gaps beautifully and got as many runs as he could with the least amount of risk involved.

Brathwaite displayed a lot of discipline, grit and willingness to ensure his team earned a first innings lead and got ahead of Pakistan’s total of 281. It paid off as they eventually did overhaul the score and though he was running out of partners he took the team total to 337 before the last man standing Shannon Gabriel was removed by Wahab Riaz. The opener remained unconquered in the inning and carried his bat in the inning unbeaten on 142 for which he faced 318 deliveries and scored those runs with a contribution of just 11 boundaries.

For Pakistan Wahab was the pick of the bowlers as he registered the second five-wicket haul of his Test career. His partner Amir got 3 while Yasir Shah and Zulfiqar Babar shared a wicket each. In their response the Pakistani openers also got off to a good start but just when it looked like they will clear off the deficit without any damage Holder had Sami Aslam caught by Joseph and the opening stand of 37 runs was broken.

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The skipper then struck twice in quick succession to send back Asad Shafiq and Younis Khan back to the pavilion for dual ducks while Roston Chase dismissed skipper Misbah-ul-Haq for 4. At stumps Pakistan have 87 runs on the board for the loss of 4 wickets with a lead of 31 runs.

Here is how Twitter reacted during the 3rd day’s play:

https://twitter.com/Peshawar__Zalmi/status/793438572653281280