Twitterati laud Haris Sohail’s debut Test knock

When the Pakistan selectors decided to pick Haris Sohail ahead of Fawad Alam, there was a lot of noise in their cricketing circles. While the former has not played any first-class cricket in the last two years the latter has piled on the runs in domestic cricket. They stuck with the decision and also handed him his debut cap in the first Test of the series against Pakistan.

And boy did he prove them right? He’d have heard all the chatter ahead of his Test debut but decided to answer them with his grit. He walked in to bat when the team was sliding, after Asad Shafiq, Babar Azam, Azhar Ali and Sarfraz Ahmed got out in quick succession. There was little hope for Pakistan to now swipe off the deficit.

Sohail stitched important partnerships with the lower order batsmen and didn’t just deny the Lankan bowlers easy wickets but also kept the scoreboard rolling. He scored a half century as Hasan Ali partnered him with a brilliant 29. The left-hander lost partners but kept getting the runs and soon they had cleared off the trail.

By the time he was dismissed as the last wicket in the innings, Sohail had scored 76 runs, the best part of his innings was not the seven boundaries and two sixes that he hit but the desire he displayed to stick on the wicket and the determination to do it even though he just had the not so competent tail for company. On the back of this effort, Pakistan managed a slender 2-run lead in the first innings.

His 76 is now the highest score by a Pakistan batsman batting at No.6 on debut. Twitterati was impressed with his knock and chose this as the opportunity to shut those who were questioning Sohail’s Test selection.

Here are some of the best reactions that emerged during and after his knock: