The last time Pakistan won a Test series against South Africa was way back in 2003 in the two-Test series 1-0. After that, the two teams played six series, of which Africa won four. In that period, Pakistan had a 2-10 win-loss record against South Africa, their worst against any team.

Pakistan won the first Test by seven wickets in Karachi and the second Test by 95 runs in Rawalpindi last week. It was the first occasion when Pakistan won two back-to-back Tests against South Africa.

This is Pakistan’s only second Test series win over South Africa in 12 attempts, having lost eight and drawn three. Now Pakistan have recorded series wins over every Test side in the last 15 years.

On the other side, South Africa have now lost four of their last five series and 10 of their last 13 Tests. It was South Africa’s 21st successive failure when they were chasing over 200 runs target.

South Africa’s pathetic run in Asia continues. The second Test defeat against Pakistan was their ninth consecutive defeat in the sub-continent. Before the 2-0 defeat in Pakistan, they lost the last two Tests of the series in India in 2015-16, and then lost 2-0 in Sri Lanka in 2018, and 3-0 in India the following year with many of the same members of the line-ups that were defeated in Pakistan. Only Bangladesh and West Indies have a worse record of 10 defeats in a row in Asia.

It was one of the weakest South African sides that played against Pakistan. Their inexperienced top and middle order suffered batting collapses in each of their innings and missed a couple of chances in the field. South Africa who are regarded as the top fielding side performed like a low grade team in the field. They dropped at least seven easy catches in the series, including the costly one of Mohammad Rizwan in Rawalpindi, who was dropped on four. He went on to score a match-winning 115 not out.

In Rawalpindi, when Pakistan were 76-5 at one stage, fielders dropped Rizwan and Faheem Ashraf off the two consecutive balls.

It was a disappointing series for Test captain Quinton de Kock as he scored only 74 runs in the series with a top score of 29. Due to the load of work, de Kock will be relieved of the Test captaincy at the end of this series.

With the series win, Pakistan earned 8 rating points and reached the fifth position in the International Cricket Council (ICC) Test team rankings. This is the first time since January 2017 that Pakistan team has been ranked among top 5 Test teams. Pakistan were at the 7th position before the start of the series, while South Africa were fifth.

Babar Azam in his first assignment as Test captain showed his skills in leading Pakistan at a young age. He handled the team quite nicely. His bowling changes and field placing paid dividends in the shape of series win.

The fans hope that Babar will develop with time and get confidence.

Another positive aspect of the series was improvement in Pakistan team’s fielding, especially catching. Some exceptional catches were taken in the slips and other positions that boost the bowlers’ confidence and they performed at their best.

The Test series win gave some relief to the coaching staff, especially head coach Misbah-ul-Haq. He had been under threat and come close to sacking after the dismal tour of New Zealand where they lost the Test series (0-2) and the Twenty20 series (1-2).

Jubilant Misbah after the series win said that the “win over South Africa was like a breath of fresh air” for a Pakistan team which had until then been low on confidence, and also hoped that it puts an end to questions about his own performance as head coach.

Playing on home conditions always plays a vital role in giving youngsters enough confidence to show their skills. The new selection committee acted in a hurry when they dropped Shan Masood and Haris Sohail on the basis of their performances in New Zealand. Both players have strong record in domestic matches and know home pitches better than other players.

Shan Masood has scored 7440 runs, including 15 hundreds and 36 fifties in domestic first class cricket. Haris Sohail has scored 4881 runs with 13 centuries and 28 half-centuries in the domestic circuit.

Fawad Alam again proved with his performance that keeping him out from the national team was a big mistake.

Fast bowler Hasan Ali made a fine comeback after a year-long injury layoff. He was particularly impressive in the second Test in which he grabbed 10 wickets. It was Hasan’s first 10-wicket haul in the longest format.

Hasan’s 10-wicket haul was only the second instance in the last 14 years when any Pakistani fast bowler took 10 or more wickets. The other one is Mohammad Abbas who took 10-95 against Australia in Abu Dhabi in 2018.

South African opener Aiden Markram remained the most successful batsman of the Test series with 227 runs including one hundred and one fifty, averaging 56.75. Allrounder Faheem Ashraf was the top scorer for Pakistan with 171 runs at an average of 85.50 with two fifties.

Fawad Alam (171) and Man-of-the-Series Mohammad Rizwan (166) were the other leading scorers of the series. Skipper Babar Azam with one half-century scored 122 runs in the series.

On the other hand, it was a miserable series for Pakistan openers Abid Ali and Imran Butt as both failed to provide solid foundation in both Tests and scored only 33 and 36, respectively. They shared opening partnerships of 5, 22, 21 & 0 in the four innings of the Test series.

On the bowling side, Pindi Test hero Hasan Ali was the highest wicket-taker of the series with 12 wickets, averaging 19.66. For the Proteas, Keeshav Maharaj took 10 wickets, averaging 31.

Debutant Nauman Ali and Yasir Shah shared eight wickets each, but Nauman averaged (21.50) much better than Yasir (30.37).

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