Pakistan turn the screw as England bowlers toil at Edgbaston

Pakistan batsman Azhar Ali turns the ball off his hip and sets off for a run to complete his hundred. Picture: Nick Potts/PA Wire

Pakistan’s second-wicket pair were immovable for 62 overs, after opener Mohammad Hafeez gifted England an immediate breakthrough.

Azhar (139) fell to the very last ball before stumps, but had a tenth Test hundred under his belt by then out of 257 for three in reply to 297.

Aslam (82) was on course, at 20 in his third match at this level, to become the youngest opener to make a Test century in England until his partner called him for a faulty single to cover and he was run out by James Vince’s direct hit.

Azhar responded, as Pakistan hoped and England feared, by digging in again alongside Younus Khan to put on another 76 until he fenced a slip catch to Alastair Cook off Chris Woakes to marginally raise the hosts’ spirits at last.

Azhar and Aslam’s stand, Pakistan’s second highest for the second wicket in this country, was a triumph of patience and sound shot selection.

It owed much too, though – especially before lunch – to the breathing space they were allowed by a collectively off-colour home attack. England dropped Azhar twice too – on 38 and 69 – a contrast to  Pakistan’s flawless effort in the field the previous day.

Hafeez’s dismissal was the result of a moment which fell short of Test match standards in all aspects, apart from Gary Ballance’s competent catching at point. James Anderson’s untypically poor, short and very wide delivery did him little credit in the first over of another intermittently cloudy day – but brought an even worse shot from Hafeez, who guided a cut straight into the fielder’s hands.

That was as good as it got for England. Their seamers improved after lunch but Anderson’s mood, already grumpy after an exchange with umpire Joel Wilson over running on the pitch, did not improve when Joe Root dropped a sharp chance away to his left at second slip – Azhar’s first reprieve.

England’s all-time leading wicket-taker kept his discipline with the ball, if not entirely in his deportment between deliveries, and runs did not come easily – only 23, in fact, from 13 overs in the first hour of the afternoon.

But home fortunes were summed up when a throw from the deep clipped the stumps, wrong-footing both Jonny Bairstow and the backing-up fielders and going for four overthrows to bring up the Pakistan hundred.

Azhar and Aslam were content to continue the slow grind, and were repaid with 50s which respectively contained six and five fours from 129 and 135 balls.

Moeen Ali missed England’s second chance, Azhar again surviving but this time when a tough caught-and-bowled went down.

By the time Aslam paid for Azhar’s misjudgment, and Vince’s accuracy, a run-out had perhaps become England’s best bet.

So it proved, but Azhar embraced his responsibility to go beyond three figures for the first time outside Asia.

Anderson’s tetchiness, and England’s concern, was doubtless amplified when Wilson’s colleague Bruce Oxenford warned him twice in one over for running on the pitch – leaving Anderson one more admonition away from exclusion from the attack for the rest of the innings.

By the close, there seemed sure to be even less for any of the Englishmen to smile about, until Azhar finally made a telling mistake.

Afterwards, Anderson apologised to the umpires for his “out of order” behaviour when he had an angry exchange with the umpires.

He said: “I’ve always had a bit of an issue with running on the wicket, I know I’m tight, so there was frustration there.

“I probably got a little bit out of order at one point with the umpires; I’ve apologised to both of them for my behaviour.

“But that’s just the way I play the game, I’m competitive, I want to try and get wickets and when the day is a frustrating one like this, it can get a little bit frustrating. I’d rather have that little bit of competitiveness, I think it’s helped me in the past, but I also want to play within the spirit of the game.”