Shan Masood might have been on his way one ball into his innings, chopping very nearly back on to his stumps. Or indeed, of the second ball, which flew through the slip cordon for four. Eight deliveries later, a sprightlier man than Jomel Warrican would have got more than fingertips to another edge off the splice of Masood's bat. And in the following over, quicker reactions than Roston Chase produced may have resulted in a catch rather than a burst through the fingers for four.
He may not have known, initially, which way the ball was going, but Masood knew what he wanted to do with it. In between that flurry of chances, Jayden Seales pitched one up to him, and Masood quickly pounced on it, whipping the ball through midwicket for an actual, controlled boundary. When Roach dropped one short, he rocked back and punched behind cover, the ball finding the rope once more. He sported the same broad grin and defiant gait regardless of whether the boundaries came off the edge or the middle; the runs, Masood understood, just needed to keep flowing at that point of maximum peril.
The danger lurked not just generally for Pakistan, who had just lost Azan Awais in a Test where they had gone in a batter short, but personally for Masood. It has not exactly gone unremarked that this is his first innings since losing the Test captaincy after a stint that never really took off; not to forget the vulnerable position former Pakistan captains tend to be in after losing the armband. He would have known, too, that had one of those early edges found the stumps or a fielder's hands, the criticism of the outcome his risks had produced would have poured in. That has been converted to praise for his positivity now that he sits, undefeated, 12 runs shy of a hundred.
It is in that context that Masood's unselfishness before tea on the second day in Tarouba is thrown into sharper relief. Evaluating the wisdom of his strategy by what happened this innings would be like deciding upon the wisdom of gambling by how your next bet comes in. He may have relied on more good fortune than most batters get in a particular knock, but Masood had shorn all else from his mind in service of a single question:x how best to get as many runs from whatever time he had at the crease.
He might have poked and prodded and got himself out in more seemly fashion, but it wouldn't have given the partnership with Imam-ul-Haq its first 92 runs in just 84 balls. One may have found slips if he pushed gently rather than slashed with hard hands allowing it to look like a better dismissal, but that approach stood no chance of dragging momentum away from a West Indies fast-bowling attack that, while errant, threatened when they sorted out their lines.
By the time Masood got to his half-century at better than a-run-a-ball, his control percentage stood at just 71. Unsustainably low for an innings that long, but then again, the more sedate Imam, who had contributed 29 in 48 by lunch, only bettered that by a percentage. West Indies were making both batters struggle for control, but only one had wiped out a large chunk of the deficit inside an hour.
The uncharitable at that point might have dismissed it all as the empty bravado of a marksman with no arrows left in his quiver. But Masood was playing a proper Test innings: adapting to the changing demands of conditions and match situations. With the ball settling down and the menace the seamers posed receding, there no longer remained a need to endanger his wicket in quite the same manner.
Masood settled into a more tranquil rhythm, refusing to give the bowlers any encouragement. He even let Imam take on the bulk of the run-scoring duty; his last 89 balls in the day produced just 34 runs. Whereas ten fours had, by fair means or foul, come off his bat before lunch, he added just one more in the whole of the final session. The control percentage had ticked up to 80%, a Test innings that began as a haphazard dash maturing into a more discernible shape.
That does not downplay West Indies' misfortune, and there came a reminder of it at the very end. Seales struck him on the boot with a near-perfect inswinging yorker that the umpire refused to raise his finger for. It looked for all purposes dead in front and was crashing into middle, only for Hawkeye to suggest some doubt as to whether it had struck him in line. It was the second lbw shout umpire's call had rescued him for, and while the luck might have seemed munificent early on, Masood had, by now, perhaps earned it.
With West Indies enjoying a strong spell to sign off, removing Babar Azam towards the end, Masood shut shop, a shot or three from three figures. He may get there, he may not. But that, again, is not a process, but an outcome. And outcomes have served Masood well over the past three years. But, as last night showed, they have not blunted his clear-thinking with bat in hand.