England captain Ollie Pope paid tribute to a “phenomenal” England performance and “two greedy Yorkshiremen” after his side recorded a famous win in Pakistan.
Harry Brook and Joe Root batted for hours as England racked up a score of 823 for seven during the first Test win in Multan.
Brook hit 317, England’s highest individual score in 34 years, and Root made a career-best 262 to set the game up for the bowlers and by the fifth morning skipper Pope was celebrating victory by an innings and 47 runs.
“Everyone knows what a special win that was. It’s been a serious effort,” said Pope.
“Whenever you get 550, whatever pitch it is, it’s always a good score, but we also knew if we batted like we know we can then we can go big.
“We’ve got two greedy Yorkshiremen and they did exactly that. What they did was seriously special and a joy to watch.
“It’s been phenomenal. You take confidence from those previous performances when you’re that far behind in the game but the main thing for us in that changing room is that we try not to think about the end result too much during the game.
“Especially if we’re behind we know if we can rock up, give absolutely 100 per cent, chase the ball as hard as we can in the field and do those small things, then the bigger things will look after themselves.
“That’s what has allowed us to go and put together these performances and good wins in situations where, in the past, we potentially wouldn’t have got over the line.”
Stand-in skipper Pope missed out with the bat, scoring zero in the fourth-highest Test total of all time. He says he does not know yet if regular captain Ben Stokes will be fit to return for the second Test on Tuesday.
“We made 800 and I got a donut,” Pope said.
“Fingers crossed Ben is all good. I’m not sure. He has had a good week training, but I will be ready if not.”
