Root takes England to Lord’s 1–0 up as Babar returns from a broken hand

The second Test between England and Pakistan was due to start at Lord’s on 27 August with England already a match up and Pakistan waiting on their captain’s hand. Rain delayed the first morning. The series is part of the 2025–27 World Test Championship. A home win at Lord’s would give England the three-match rubber with a game still to play at the end of the first week of September.

Joe Root’s second spell as captain began last week at Headingley with a win by an innings and 103 runs inside three days. Pakistan were bowled out for 171 and 135. England made 409. Ollie Robinson and Josh Tongue took eight wickets each across the two innings. Harry Brook scored 91, Jordan Cox 73 and Root 66. Four England batters passed fifty. None of them reached a hundred. It did not matter.

This week Root plays his 168th Test, one more than Stuart Broad’s tally and level with Ricky Ponting and Steve Waugh. The landmark is a counting exercise. The cricket question is whether the same seam attack can work at Lord’s after a pitch at the ground was called “unsatisfactory” by the ICC following the two-day New Zealand Test in June, which picked up a demerit point.

Pakistan have won their last two Lord’s Tests against England, in 2016 and 2018, and hold five wins against four losses in 15 Tests against England at the ground. England have won their last four Lord’s Tests, stretching back to the West Indies in 2024. The last home defeat there was against Australia in the 2023 Ashes.

Babar Azam missed Headingley with a right-hand injury first picked up in the West Indies and then aggravated at Beckenham. Bowling coach Umar Gul said on Tuesday that Babar had completed a full batting session and that the side was “hopeful” he would play. He was Pakistan’s top scorer on the Caribbean tour, with 193 runs in a drawn two-Test series. His return is the main change available to a side that fielded poorly and bowled without a consistent length in Leeds.

England’s probable eleven, on preview sheets, ran Emilio Gay, Ben Duckett, Jordan Cox, Root, Brook, Dan Lawrence, Jamie Smith, Gus Atkinson, Jofra Archer, Robinson and Tongue. Sonny Baker came into the squad after Brydon Carse was placed under an ECB investigation. The off-field noise around the squad, including a drinking story that followed the Headingley win, is a tabloid fact. It does not add runs.

Pakistan have not won a Test series in England for 30 years. On the evidence of Headingley they are closer to 3–0 down than to a fightback. Lord’s has been kinder to them than Leeds. A dry pitch and a fit Babar would at least give the batting a spine. Rain on the first morning gives both dressing rooms a day to argue about who benefits from a shortened match. England, 1–0 up with a three-day win already in the book, can afford the weather more than Pakistan can.