Big picture: Back on the road again

And now, without even a pause to put the clocks back, they are back on their winter travels again to Pakistan, a place where England hadn't set foot for nearly two decades from 2005, but will soon have played six Tests in the space of two years, which is more away matches than even Australia and India have warranted in a similar timeframe.

Talking of such things England's hosts are past masters of the chaotic. Leaving aside their grim recent record of five Test defeats in a row - two of which came in a seminal home series loss to Bangladesh last month - Pakistan's brand of dysfunction is best expressed in the nonsensical build-up to this series, which involved a near-daily churn of contradictory briefings about the preferred venues for the three Tests.

With Karachi and Lahore out of commission, and Rawalpindi pre-booked by an international conference, serious thought had been given to booting the show out to Abu Dhabi instead - much to Brendon McCullum's chagrin - before back-to-back fixtures in Multan were finally settled upon late last month. Despite the country's numerous hidden charms, Pakistan has never been a favourite venue for the travelling fan, and with numerous tour operators giving up on their plans amid the uncertainty, that is unlikely to change in the coming weeks.

Times have changed fairly quickly since then, not least in the evolution of England's bowling attack. None of the three key protagonists on that previous tour - Anderson, Mark Wood and Ollie Robinson - will be making the return trip, with their not-quite-like-for-like replacements, Chris Woakes, Brydon Carse and Gus Atkinson combining in a seam attack that has played precisely zero overseas Tests in the whole of the Bazball era.

What's more, with Stokes absent through injury, the pressure will be on Ollie Pope to conjure the same alchemy from the tools at his disposal. Though he acquitted himself well as a leader in his three Tests against Sri Lanka, Pope was arguably guilty of over-attacking in their final-match loss at the Kia Oval - a trait which revealed the degree of subtlety in Stokes' methods that can sometimes be lost in the bravado of his team's overall approach.

If Pakistan have an edge, therefore, it will be in the make-up of their bowling attack. The union of Shaheen Afridi, Naseem Shah and Aamer Jamal is, on paper, the best attack that they have fielded in months, and offers a cutting edge that was absent for much of that 2022 campaign in particular. Though Jamal has played just three Tests, each of those came in a superb 18-wicket debut series in Australia, while a fully-fit Naseem could yet leave England longing for the 150kph exocets that Wood brought to that previous success.

No doubt the context of this series will come flooding back out once the teams take the field and Test cricket's familiar rhythms are back on centre stage. But right now, with no build-up, no fanfare - quite possibly no fans either - it does rather feel like cricket for the sake of cricket. The team that manages to park that existentialism the best may well steal an important march in the course of the coming five days.

Form guide

Pakistan LLLLL (last five Tests, most recent first)
England LWWWW

In the spotlight - Abrar Ahmed and Chris Woakes

Team news: Pakistan bring back the big bowling guns

Pakistan: 1 Saim Ayub, 2 Abdullah Shafique, 3 Shan Masood (capt), 4 Babar Azam, 5 Saud Shakeel, 6 Mohammad Rizwan (wk), 7 Salman Ali Agha, 8 Aamer Jamal, 9 Shaheen Afridi, 10 Naseem Shah, 11 Abrar Ahmad

England welcome back Crawley at the top of the order, although he won't field in the slips due to the broken finger he sustained during the summer. Stokes, however, misses out once again, through a surfeit of caution as he gets himself back to full strength after a hamstring tear in August. Carse will make his debut, at the venue where his Durham team-mate Wood proved so effective two years ago, alongside Atkinson and Woakes - playing his first subcontinent Test since 2016 - while Jack Leach is set for his first appearance since the tour of India in February, alongside his Somerset team-mate Shoaib Bashir.

England: 1 Zak Crawley, 2 Ben Duckett, 3 Ollie Pope (capt), 4 Joe Root, 5 Harry Brook, 6 Jamie Smith (wk), 7 Chris Woakes, 8 Gus Atkinson, 9 Brydon Carse, 10 Jack Leach, 11 Shoaib Bashir

Pitch and conditions: Greener than standard in Multan

The Multan pitch has some grass on it but it was shaved on Saturday afternoon. England are not expecting the ball to reverse as early as it did on their last visit in 2022, as the square and outfield are much greener. There could, however, be some low bounce, to judge by the practice strips.

Stats and trivia

Quotes

"We came close to winning last time, but we let the matches slip away. We know how they play, but at the end of the day we have to see how to tackle it. We are clear in our mind and that's why we have named the XI."
Pakistan's captain, Shan Masood believes his team has the tools to atone for their 3-0 loss two years ago.

"We've got the skillset to fill that gap that Jimmy's left. Obviously it's never going to be easy, but it's going to be a great opportunity for those guys to learn and to bowl in some different conditions."
Ollie Pope believes England's seam attack can rise to the challenge in unfamiliar conditions.