Bazball unpacked: how England have turned up the dial in Test cricket

If one match captures it, it was England’s 74-run win in Rawalpindi against Pakistan last December. With hindsight, we can imagine exactly how England planned to go about this game, something along the lines of: “This pitch is flat, and we will need to bowl at least 250 overs to have a chance of getting Pakistan out twice. Given that it is winter, and will be getting dark early, there will probably be around 400 overs in the match. So that means we can’t bat for more than 150 overs across our two innings. If Pakistan score at their usual 3.5 runs an over across their two innings, they will get about 875. Which means we need 900 ourselves, and we need them in 150 overs.” The result? England scored 921 runs in 136.5 overs (a run-rate of 6.73) and bowled Pakistan out for 579 and 268 in a total of 252 overs, to win with around 20 minutes of light remaining. Bazball buys the bowlers time and never more so than in ’Pindi, a ground where Australia’s visit nine months earlier returned just 24 wickets and three innings in a soporific draw.

Aside from that match, only one other team have made 500‑plus runs in a Test at six or more per over and that was … also England, against Ireland at Lord’s this month. Since Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum took charge, the team have scored at 4.85 runs per over overall. If you look at the best run-rates by captains in Test cricket (factoring in the one‑off Test match Stokes captained in 2020 that slightly drops his figure by 0.2), there is daylight between this England team and second place.

Steve Waugh’s great Australian team, which dominated cricket at the turn of the century, tried to score at four runs an over, and although they didn’t quite achieve it they got closer than any other team.