Southampton, Aug 22 (IANS): Jos Buttler scored his second Test century in another luckless session for Pakistan in the third Test at the Ageas Bowl in Southampton.
The first session of Day 2 saw two rain-delays, one of which lasted for more than an hour but there seemed to be no break in momentum for the two batsmen.
Buttler did a better part of the scoring, starting the day on 87 and crossing over into the 90s before the first rain delay.
He had to wait to get past the 100-run barrier with another rain delay keeping the players off the field for about 20 minutes. When he did however, it was in rather dramatic fashion.
Buttler had been given out against Mohammad Abbas on 99 for caught-behind but he managed to review it successfully. He then took the three off the very next ball to score his first Test ton since August 2018 and only the second of his career overall.
Buttler scored 13 more runs in the session while Crawley was on 186 when the players walked off for lunch. The partnership is now worth 246 runs, just nine runs away from the English record for the fifth wicket that was set by Tony Greig and Keith Fletcher against India in Mumbai in 1973.
Crawley and Buttler had in the third session of the first day ran Pakistan ragged and helped England wrestle back control on Day 1 of the third Test between the two sides at the Ageas Bowl on Friday.
Brief scores: England 373/4 (Crawley 186*, Buttler 113*; Yasir 2/107) vs Pakistan
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