When Wahab was more than an enforcer

You remember that spell. Everyone does, to the point that a lot of people outside Pakistan remember him only for that spell. And because people only remember that spell, he gets a little typecast.

Here's Wahab Riaz. This is what Wahab Riaz does. He gallops in, breaking through walls of wind, loads up, and then roughs the batsmen up. He goes for their heads, he goes for their armpits, he goes for their toes. He is a brute, the grunt who comes in for dead surfaces on dead days with dead balls and out of all this deadness he tries to create some life. It's not as if it doesn't work.

There will always be that spell. There have been others. The first, for instance, at The Oval; in Mohali; his Test return at the SSC in Colombo in 2014; the nine-over spell of reverse-swing in Dubai against England when the ball dipped away, not in to the right-hander; the wicketless spell at Lord's this year; the mini-burst at The Oval; even at the MCG last week in which he dismissed David Warner off a no-ball. He is a great spells man. This is all he does. He creates an atmosphere, drops in a little bit of magic for the occasion, making a little something out of nothing, a little anything out of nothing.

He doesn't always get the wickets he deserves though, as he has pointed out in the aftermath of the MCG, he is behind only Yasir Shah as Pakistan's leading wicket-taker across all formats in the last two years. But, often, he doesn't get the support. He doesn't have a Josh Hazlewood at the other end, or a Jackson Bird, diligently working away at batsmen so that they are compelled to chance it against the wild quick.

Maybe sometimes he wants to open out a little bit, to expand his range. Maybe he wants to show the world that he isn't a one-trick pony, that he isn't just that or those spells. Maybe sometimes he wants to bowl with a new cherry.

Today was one of those days when Wahab wasn't the enforcer, the one day out of ten when he did what Wahab doesn't normally do. And he wasn't bad with it either, even if the results of his work are likely to be lost amid carnage. If Pakistan are to remember this day by anything, a day when any pretense about the potential of this attack was stripped away, then it should be for the role Wahab fulfilled.

That was, primarily, to go to the default Misbah-ul-Haq setting for his pacemen when things are either not going anywhere, or going haywire: go well outside off, back of a length, or fuller, and dry up the runs. He was doing for Misbah what a succession of fast bowlers, of all shades and colours and actions have done. He even got a newish ball to play with, only seven overs old when he came on, though given the pasting it had received, it might have looked 30 overs gone.

"We have to see the situation and how it goes," Wahab said later. "When I was about to come they were batting really well and scoring at five an over. That time, if I had attacked, it could have been a different ball game."

At first reading of that explanation, it seems as if he is defending his defensive lines, and that if only he had been allowed to attack, it might have worked out better for Pakistan. He saw sense, eventually, enough to acknowledge that having more than just one dimension is no bad thing.

"You have to read the situation and at that time, it was my role that I had to keep one end quiet so we can put a bit more pressure from one side. As a bowler you should have all those things in you. Mostly my team uses me to attack the opposition. This time the situation was really different. I know what my role was. I am experienced enough to know what I have to do at what time."

It didn't mean that he wasn't taking wickets, just that he has found a smarter - okay, a different - way of taking them. He was pleased about the one that got Warner: it may have seemed like a loose shot but on a slow pitch, he bowled this one quicker and got more bounce than the previous balls in the over. Most of the day he bowled well below the speeds he can and does hit and having meticulously re-calibrated his run-up the day before in training, only bowled a couple of no-balls. Two too many, but after the horrors at the MCG, another little triumph.

Pakistan will take that and they will take Wahab's adaptability because they will take precious little else from a bowling display that must count among the poorest they have had under Misbah. Wahab was not hiding behind any excuses in his assessment of the day, or his attack. Warner's innings was special, but Pakistan did all they could to make it so.

"Everybody knows Warner is an attacking player and we know where he is strong," he said. "But as a bowling unit if we keep making those mistakes and making him play on his strong area, then we look foolish. I think the plans were there, given by the coaches. They've been working really hard, but it's the execution of the players and so far our execution is not up to the mark.

"The wicket is on the slow side, but we play in Dubai. This wasn't that much different to those, this was on the slow side. We have bowled a lot there [UAE], we have a lot of experience there. But the problem is as a bowling unit, we are not being able to execute our plans properly. It is our own fault, we are not doing it."

Bowling abroad is something Pakistan have struggled with throughout 2016, especially during their opening spells in England and New Zealand. Generally, they have been able to adjust and pull back but they have rarely known who their best three pacemen are. In Australia, where they have now conceded 429 and 202 for 5 declared, 624 for 8 declared and currently 365 for 3 in a day, the situation has become alarming. In each Test they have played a different third seamer.

"Everything is planned according to the track and situation and according to the games," Wahab said. "Obviously, I will say, at the end of the day, it is the bowling unit that is not doing good. As a bowling unit we have let our team down really."

As an assessment, that last is as uncompromising as any bouncer he has bowled.