Pakistan held their spirit to claim first Test victory against Australia in 15 years. On the fourth day Pakistan just needed 40 runs but lost four wickets before to finishing on 180 for seven. Pakistan three wicket win leveled the two Test match series 1-1. Fast bowler Umar Gul hit the winning runs for Pakistan and ended the 15 years victory drought and 13 straight Test defeats against Australia a record for one country against another. Michael Hussey appealed a gully catch against Kamran Akmal when he was on 13, but slow motions replays were uncertain.  Finally Muhammad Aamir edge the Ban Hilfehnaus through the slips for four to tie the scores. Then there is another twist around when Kamran Akmal brilliantly caught by Michael Hussey off Johnson and this time there was no doubt.

Umar Gul hammered his first ball off Johnson and Pakistan won on the fourth morning. Pakistan new captain Salman Butt, who replaced Shahid Afridi after Lord’s Test, gets the victory in his first Test as Pakistan captain. Butt was very excited victory over Australia after a long time; it was bit nerve wracking when you have this additional responsibility. I am sure, this victory will be new beginning for Pakistan cricket and thank God it went positively and we have won the match. In the end, Australia paid the price for being bowled out for only 88 runs in their first innings their lowest Test total since they were dismissed on 76 against West Indies at Perth in 1984. Australia sensed the possibility of a significant victory, when 19 runs still needed and four wickets left for Pakistan, but in the end Pakistan stumbled across the line.

Australian captain Ricky Ponting said; at the end of day, it is a big impact, and that is my responsibility to sort the things right. Everyone was amazed at how much it seemed on the first day. Muhammad Aamir and Shane Watson won their respective man the match awards. Australia has to play two Test matches against India in October before the Ashes series starts on home soil in November.

Pakistan’s long, long wait for a Test victory over Australia lastly came to an end. In losing every single Test for nearly 15 years to Australia. In that time Australia have built decisively and maintained ruthlessly a dominance of the game almost unequalled, which is only now beginning to rust. More and less in the same period but more pointedly from 1999 onwards Pakistan’s years have been dark ones, under pressure to build anything they haven’t themselves taken down right away. Australia has prospered; Pakistan has flourished, fight back, flourished, struggled and then struggled more. No opponent has had as stretched and atrocious a grip over Pakistan in the modern age as Australia; no opponent has so exposed Pakistan’s vast spectrum of frailties physical and mental; no opponent has so mocked Pakistan with the saying that talent alone is nothing; no opponent has stuffed down their throats as vehemently the truth of sport today, that triumph has a collective, not individual, imprint. Until the end of that 1995-96 series, there was a degree of equality about their jostling; Pakistan had won 11 to Australia’s 14 Tests. Since then they only ever came close to not being whipped three times and each time they lost, in Hobart in 1999, in Colombo in 2002 and in Sydney in 2009, and imagination is build that  Australia cannot be beaten. But Salman Butt to be the man to smash this hold but few second-guess Pakistan cricket correctly. Butt had his moments here, some nice hunches, some level-headedness but some scary, panicked moments too.

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