PAK vs ENG 3rd Test Day 3 – Sajid and Noman enjoy the moment Pakistan's plans take shape

“Nomi Bhai is one of the most experienced players in the Pakistan national team,” Sajid said at the presentation. “We should share these Player of the Series awards. “He's a great spinner who has also mentored me and helped me and so he deserves just as much credit.”

And although Sajid insists that the game situation didn't worry him, the expectation that weighed on him was a different matter entirely. “There wasn't that much pressure (in the series), but (there was) some pressure from the comeback. The captain, the vice-captain, the whole team fit together well. We play domestic cricket together, on wickets like that. “So there wasn’t as much pressure.”

38-year-old Noman has the experience of not taking any opportunity for granted. “I feel like it has been a while since we performed well in Pakistan,” he said as he sat next to Sajid at the post-series press conference. “We are grateful that we had the conditions to win the series in this way. The way we have come back is particularly pleasing and we hope to find similar conditions in the future and pose difficulties for other teams.”

If Pakistan wants to adopt this strategy in the future – a prospect which Noman unsurprisingly supported – he believed it would have to implement it properly. “I think if you want to prepare spinners you have to play more red-ball cricket,” he said. “In first-class cricket you get all kinds of conditions with new and old ball. If you do that, you have a lot of experience.”