Day two of Pakistan Vs England at Headingley was slowed before a ball was bowled, with steady mizzle hanging over the ground and the scheduled 11am BST start already in doubt. The city buildings in the background were fading into a grey fug, the sort of morning that leaves a live blog waiting on weather rather than cricket.
Zain Malik summed up the mood in a message to the coverage, saying he hoped James was enjoying the Test and adding that he was most certainly not. James replied that it was “steady mizzle at Headingley” and said the forecast was not good for most of the day, with only a thin chance of improvement later on. For supporters and for England and Pakistan, that meant the second day was already being measured in lost minutes and uncertain sessions.
The delay matters because this is not just any fixture. The first Test is the latest live chapter in a contest that had already been framed by the weather, and Headingley has long had a way of turning cricket into a waiting game. When play finally begins, the day will have to be built around whatever windows the rain leaves behind, with each session vulnerable to the next spell of drizzle.
There is also a sharper edge to the timing. England’s recent rise under Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes began in 2022 after one win in their last 17 Tests, and one of the clearest reminders of what Headingley can produce came against India five years ago this month, when Root made three figures after India were bowled out for 78. That history gives the ground a sense of possibility, but on this morning the live coverage was being driven less by shot-making than by whether the sky would let the match breathe at all.
That is the unresolved question as the day unfolds: whether the rain will merely delay the start or keep breaking up the session lengths once play eventually gets going. The forecast has already tilted the morning against cricket, and at Headingley that usually means the match can only move forward in scraps.
