If you really want to know what happened these past five days in Mirpur, this really isn't where you should be. Go read the other piece, that lively tale about a Test side which actually improves incrementally over time. The story of a side that realised it could not rely on the home comforts of spin bowling indefinitely, refreshed its attitude towards pace as well as its pitches, and has now begun to see that work reflected in results. That is the fresh, new story. This? This is just a recycling.
A recycling of a team that has learned none of the lessons from propping up the table in the last World Test Championship. A recycling of a side that, certainly, has learned none of the lessons of their last Test defeats to Bangladesh, where insipid bowling and second-innings collapses mirrored almost precisely what they served up this week. A recycling of a batting order that has been secure in its mediocrity and regressed with each passing Test, and a bowling attack that cannot take 20 wickets until the whole apparatus of their curating infrastructure is manipulated to achieve that narrow, short-sighted outcome. A recycling, even, of what their captain Shan Masood will say after the inevitable defeat: "hindsight is 20-20" were the first words from the presentations, a phrase he has repeated so often post-defeat that, ironically, you don't need much foresight to know what he's going to say.
It was telling, in a game where Pakistan got thrown around by Bangladesh at will in, that the only positives came from men who had the least possible exposure to this hollow, decaying Test unit. They came in the form of two debutants, not yet tarred by sufficient exposure to statistically the worst Pakistan red-ball side in six decades (the last time Pakistan lost 11 out of 15 Test was the 1960s). Abdullah Fazal and Azan Awais were Pakistan's highest-scorers in the Test, with a hundred and two half-centuries between them, and kept Pakistan hanging on to Bangladesh's coattails at various points. The other came from Mohammad Abbas, whose most recent red-ball cricket has been away from Pakistan's cricketing system all together with Derbyshire in the County Championship, and who Pakistan drop with alacrity; this was just his third Test in five years.
Aside from that, it was really just the same: the same dull side failing in the same dull ways, especially overseas; it is now their sixth successive away defeat, one short of their worst such run. Najmul Hossain Shanto and Mominul Haque were, even before this Test, considered two of Bangladesh's three best batters; they had each combined with Mushfiqur Rahim in the past year to score two century partnerships in the same Test, and paired with each other here in Mirpur to repeat the feat.
They are both left-handers, and Masood's now sizeable captaincy sample size demonstrates he would rather bowl right-arm fingerspin to lefties. It was why, for example, Salman Agha was introduced into the bowling attack before their frontline spinner Noman Ali in each innings. However, that selection itself felt from the first morning a self-inflicted shot to the foot; in Pakistan's last Test in Mirpur, offspinner Sajid Khan took 12 wickets in a dramatic final-day win, while Noman went wicketless. Conventional wisdom would suggest Pakistan play two spinners anyway, but if they were to choose, picking Noman above Sajid seemed a curious decision to make.
You might argue Bangladesh played three seamers, too, but then again, they have in Mehidy Hasan Miraz a genuine second spin option in the way Salman simply isn't. And unlike Bangladesh, Pakistan's red-ball seam options are currently little more than planned-obsolescence products on a fast track to the franchise circuit, the treatment table, or both. All of Pakistan's genuine pace options that cropped up over the last half-decade have regressed in the format. Shaheen Afridi was unable to hit the high 130s kph in the entire Test, while the threat Hasan Ali now carries is modest at best.
Not without merit, Masood was critical of Pakistan's bowling attack, especially on a lacklustre first day, but most of the batters who have been part of this side's core over the past three years hardly helped themselves across the following four days. Pakistan sneaked in two first-innings collapses either side of a 119-run stand between Mohammad Rizwan and Salman, losing four for 20 to precede it and another 5 for 37 to follow. They were shot out within two sessions on the final day, losing 5 for 11 to wrap up the game, with Nahid Rana, who took five in less than ten overs, showcasing the value of true pace wisely and sparingly used in Test cricket.
Even among the more promising performances, modest as they were, there is more scope for worry than encouragement. Imam-ul-Haq rode his luck somewhat through the first innings, and gave his wicket away softly in the little passage of pre-lunch play Bangladesh forced Pakistan to survive on day five. Salman's loose shots in each innings unseated a settled batter, while the defining image of Rizwan from this Test will not be his scrappy first-innings half-century, but his naive shouldering of arms as a tailing Rana delivery uprooted his middle stump. That may be just as well, because it helps obscure just how far from his high standards his keeping appears to have fallen, with dropped catches, missed stumps and general sloppiness combining for 20 byes in Bangladesh's first innings - an unwanted record for Rizwan.
Rounding it all off is the man who has led this side now for the better part of three years, upon whom the responsibility - if not necessarily the consequences of that responsibility - currently lies. Masood was a part of the batting implosions in each innings, and the lowest-scoring batter across both sides. It would have been, in part at least, his call to opt against Sajid at the only overseas venue where he has enjoyed prolific success, and his decision to keep Noman - who finished as the joint top wicket-taker in the second innings - out of the attack until the 36th over.
And while any captain will make marginal calls that go either way in a particular game, Masood's tenure has, in just 15 Tests, seen him become the captain who has led Pakistan to the second-highest number of defeats, with 11. It took Inzamam - who also has 11 captaincy losses - 31 Tests to get there, while the only man with more, Misbah-ul-Haq, led Pakistan out 56 times.
But, once more, it was the post-match media commitments that best demonstrated how denuded of ideas and self-reflection this side appears to have become. Once more, Masood hit upon the usual, predictable themes, simply pointing out specific moments across five days of a Test when Pakistan might have had positions of advantage, and where they could have done better. There has barely been a Test defeat that such positions have not been mentioned, but also no sign they might actually recognise, and capitalise on, the next time such positions fell their way.
That across five days of Test cricket even a mildly competent team might have their moments is barely worth pointing out, but to do so in a Test like this felt like an aptly hollow round-up of what this Pakistan side now represents. One whose drift its own cricket board is curiously apathetic to, which exists seemingly without a purpose, is inured from the consequences of its results, is indifferent to the opinions of its supporters, and oblivious to its own rapid decline.
Seriously, just go read the other piece.